Turning Fixed Costs Into Flexible Funding

For most nonprofits, insurance is a line item. Something to minimize, hand off, and forget about until renewal time rolls around. But what if that check you're already writing could come back to your organization as unrestricted revenue?

That's exactly what Kerry Martin, President of Unitas Brokerage, joined Leya Simmons to discuss on a recent episode of the 501(c) Drop. Kerry has spent decades in commercial insurance brokerage, working across some of the largest firms in the world and with clients across nearly every industry, including major nonprofits in the human services space. What he kept noticing was a system that generated enormous profits for brokers and left clients, the very organizations creating that value, with nothing. Unitas Brokerage was built to fix that.

The Problem With How Nonprofits Think About Insurance

Kerry opened with a point that resonates with anyone who has ever sat through an insurance renewal meeting: it's nearly impossible to tell the difference between brokers.

"If five folks come in and say the sky is blue, who said it the best?"

As a result, most buyers default to price, and most nonprofit leaders treat insurance as something to minimize rather than manage strategically.

That's compounded by the nature of the product itself. Insurance is a contract. You only find out how good yours is when something goes wrong, and by then it's too late to renegotiate. The combination of commoditized presentation and delayed consequence creates the perfect conditions for organizations to make decisions that don't actually serve them.

A Different Model: Clients as Equity Partners

Unitas Brokerage operates on a fundamentally different premise. Rather than simply placing insurance and collecting commissions, Unitas brings clients in as equity partners. When the brokerage profits, clients share in those distributions. What was once a pure expense becomes a revenue stream.

Kerry was direct about what makes this unusual:

"Brokers are getting bought and sold a lot. Each time, people are making a lot of money. There's a lot of money swashing around the system, and the client, the one creating that money, isn't benefiting from it."

Unitas is structured to change that equation.

What Is Alpha Pro, and How Does It Work?

Within the Unitas model, Alpha Pro is the specific program through which nonprofit partners participate in profit sharing. Kerry walked through how it works in practice: organizations continue to pay for insurance at competitive market rates, and through their equity partnership, they receive a return based on the brokerage's performance. The funds that come back are unrestricted, meaning nonprofits can deploy them however their mission demands.

Importantly, the size of the organization doesn't determine eligibility. What an organization receives is commensurate with what they bring in. Larger insurance spend means larger potential return, but smaller organizations are not excluded.

Timing Matters: What to Know Before You Switch

One of the more practical insights from the conversation was around timing. Kerry noted that the Alpha Pro model rewards consistency. Organizations that have maintained a stable insurance relationship over time tend to be better positioned, and there is roughly a three-year horizon to keep in mind when thinking about when the model starts to pay off meaningfully.

If your organization just switched insurers, that doesn't necessarily close the door, but it does affect the calculus. Kerry's guidance: don't rush a switch purely to pursue this. Let your renewal cycle be the natural trigger for exploring Unitas, and start the conversation well in advance.

What This Means in a Difficult Funding Environment

Leya framed this conversation in the broader nonprofit landscape, and it's worth sitting with. Charitable giving is broadly increasing, but the donor base is shrinking. Federal funding has contracted. Unrestricted dollars are harder to come by than ever. Against that backdrop, finding a revenue stream that doesn't require an additional ask, doesn't add to staff workload, and doesn't redirect mission energy is genuinely significant.

"I never thought of an insurance company as a financial partner," Leya said during the episode. "But that's a great reframe."

It is. When you're looking for every possible way to extend your mission, it's worth taking a hard look at the expenses you've already accepted and asking whether any of them could be working harder.

The One Thing to Take Away

Kerry closed with a thought that's worth carrying into your next budget conversation: the nonprofit sector has a history of being slow to adopt new models, but it's also full of entrepreneurial thinkers who are willing to look at things differently when the moment calls for it. This moment calls for it.

If your organization is approaching a renewal, or if you've never really examined what your insurance relationship is and isn't doing for you, it's worth a conversation with Kerry's team.