Minneapolis media arts nonprofit Pollen Midwest shuts down after nearly 15 years
Pollen Midwest, a Minneapolis media arts nonprofit that was well-known for hosting events and providing content and design work to help other nonprofits tell their stories, is closing after 14 years.
The organization announced the closure this week on its website, saying it will wind down operations this spring.
Melanie Walby, Pollen's creative director, said the closure was due to financial difficulties. The organization started as a resource for nonprofit employees to find jobs and became a convener with panels on topics such as racial justice. It had invested in growing its staffing to meet the demand for its storytelling and design services, but revenue didn't keep pace, she said.
"It was an imbalance of, we needed more people but when we brought in more people, there wasn't enough revenue to cover payroll," Walby said. "It's really hard and it's really sad, and it's a huge loss. But it's also full of gratitude for what it was."
Pollen was formed in 2009 as an e-mail newsletter with job postings following the Great Recession by Lars Leafblad, who later started the St. Paul-based executive search firm Ballinger Leafblad. In 2018, Pollen launched its creative agency, Pollen Studio. Walby said the organization was an advocate for artists and writers who were hired to do that design, illustration and writing work.
"There's a lot of artists in this community who had a lot of work through Pollen," she said. "It's kind of been this catalyst for people's careers."
While Pollen was a small nonprofit — with only a dozen employees and bringing in about $1 million a year — it was well-known in the sector for its job board, community events and storytelling. It was also seen as a leader, Leafblad said, in modeling new ways of doing business, like paying artists for their work before that was commonplace.
Pollen also had progressive benefits, including closing the office for extra time off for the whole staff and half-day Fridays during the summer, and it advocated for salary transparency, requiring postings on its job board to list pay, part of a broader movement to boost equity.
Pollen's community events, which also drew revenue, shifted to virtual platforms during the COVID-19 pandemic, which brought in less revenue and became more difficult to fundraise on, said Lolyann Gochicoa, the chair of the board.
Pollen shifted from relying on grants and events for most of its revenue to client work, but as a result it took longer to bring back in-person events, Walby said.
"It takes time to shift when you have changed the business model," she added.
The nonprofit, which recorded deficits in 2022 and 2021, according to its tax filings, launched a fundraising campaign in 2023 to raise $50,000. In the last year, the organization implemented several layoffs, reducing the staff from a dozen employees to one. Walby, who worked there for more than six years, was the only remaining employee.
Along with the COVID revenue challenges, the organization also received fewer foundation grants in recent years and struggled after its longtime executive director Jamie Millard, one of its founders, left in 2022, Gochicoa said.
"It was a perfect storm of all of things happening all at once," she said. "We've had a good run to try to stay afloat."
Millard said the closure is "heartbreaking," but "sometimes there's a false perception that organizations need to last forever and I'm really proud of them for knowing that it was time for Pollen to not keep spinning it wheels."
Gochicoa said Pollen's closure leaves a void in the nonprofit sector of connecting the community through events. "I don't think there are other organizations that feed the soul the way that Pollen does," she added.
Walby said she hopes Pollen's collaboration with so many artists, writers and nonprofit leaders over the years will inspire some of its work to live on.
"There are a lot of people in community who will continue this type of work moving forward," she said. "Pollen has really spread and grown."
