Carefully packing up the signed Patti LuPone CD, Deirdre Alby includes a heartfelt note to thank the latest person who has contributed to her cause.
The enterprising marketing director has been offering the autographed discs as a reward at the $30 level of donation — $150 buys a pair of tickets to the off-Broadway show “Stomp!” — as part of a slick fundraising campaign with the kind of incentives you’d expect from a PBS pledge drive.
But Alby’s effort is a lot more personal than financing an upcoming season of “Downton Abbey”: The 40-year-old and her husband, Harold, 34, are asking people to pay for in vitro fertilization treatments so they can fulfill their dream of having a baby.
“We are longing to start a family,” says Alby, of Manhattan, who launched the $32,000 crowd-funding project on the website GoFundMe two months ago. “It’s been a hard decision to put ourselves out there like this, but if we can finally bring home a child of our own, it will be worth it.”
The Albys, battling infertility for more than two years, are among an increasing number of couples using online crowd-funding platforms such as Indiegogo, GiveForward and YouCaring to raise thousands of dollars for IVF or adoption fees.
GoFundMe reports that the total value of donations made to people seeking IVF funding in its “Babies, Kids and Family” category worldwide stands at $1.1 million since its 2010 launch. And those numbers are growing: The amount donated between January and July 2014 is already a third higher than that collected for the entirety of 2013.
Most donations are given by family, friends and friends of friends, but strangers are encouraged to contribute. According to Marc Pitman, author of the best-selling fundraising guide “Ask Without Fear!,” “If your story is good and your cause is relatable, your college friends and co-workers might step up, but you could well find that great benefactor in the sky.”
But the trend has its detractors. Some IVF fundraisers have been criticized for going down the “hope jar” route. Jennifer Lahl, president of the Center for Bioethics and Culture, a nonprofit that campaigns on third-party reproduction issues, tells The Post: “It’s pretty cynical and presumptuous to ask friends, family and strangers for money for crazy expensive IVF. It’s tacky and tasteless. What are they going to ask for next? The child’s private school or college fund?”
Lahl, who produced the controversial documentary “Breeders,” about the ethics of surrogacy, is particularly uncomfortable about aspiring parents like Scott and Jay Paranada-Fried, a recently married gay couple who hope to raise between $5,000 and $10,000 to help foot their $80,000-to-$100,000 surrogacy deal.
“The whole thing operates at the Hallmark sentiment,” says Lahl. “It’s a case of, ‘We want it, so give it to us now.’ ”
But the Paranada-Frieds shrug off her assessment. “The circles we move in are not judgmental,” says Scott, 35, a teacher who wed his actor boyfriend in Manhattan last summer. “They know that Jay and I will make wonderful parents. That’s all that matters.”
The Alby family has a similar attitude. They have yet to receive any negative feedback, and are determined to keep their eyes on the prize.
“We’ve had a few people private-message us, saying, ‘This is great, but why don’t you guys just adopt?’ ” says Deirdre. “I was prepared for that kind of thing, but it stung a little. That word ‘just’ is so dismissive. It’s not as if it’s easy to adopt. It’s a long, drawn-out process and, in some cases, actually more expensive than IVF.”
Meanwhile, questions raised by the brave new world of IVF crowd-funding make for an interesting debate on social mores. Jodi R.R. Smith, author of “The Etiquette Book: A Complete Guide to Modern Manners,” says the moment you solicit money from people — especially when you take it to the extreme of asking them to invest in a child — you are stepping into a minefield.
“Whether they donate or not, everyone you ask will have a right to a point of view,” she explains. “But you have to seal yourself against those opinions. Whenever someone says anything that is offensive or inappropriate, you just reply, ‘Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts.’ ”
Having exhausted their $42,000 savings on three unsuccessful cycles of IVF, the Albys, who were married in January 2012, are pinning their hopes on a clinic in Virginia that charges $30,000 for six IVF attempts using donor eggs — with a money-back guarantee if they fail.
Deirdre came up with the crowd-funding idea after a brainstorming session with her marketing friends last December. She has previously worked on charitable initiatives in her job for a Broadway theater producer, raising money for “Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.”
“[My husband] Harold took a lot of persuading, because he didn’t like the idea of airing our laundry in public,” admits Deirdre. “But now he’s amazed at the kindness and generosity that people have shown.”
Donors have ranged from the father of one of Harold’s university friends to the younger sister of Deirdre’s best friend. The couple’s GoFundMe total currently stands at $4,951. They have given themselves another month to raise the remaining $27,000 before they enroll at the IVF center in Virginia. If they don’t make the target, they have the option of taking out a loan with the clinic.
Meanwhile, Scott and Jay Paranada-Fried, whose dream is to have twins biologically related to each of them, have so far collected $145 since they launched their appeal two weeks ago. Their largest donation so far came from their friends Matt and Megan Rybicki, who admit: “We neglected to give you an appropriate wedding gift, so please accept this in celebration of the wedding and the babies!”
Better late than never. Says Scott: “Twins would be the best wedding present of all!”