While big-name philanthropists give away eye-popping sums, many of the most impactful donors are those who give what they can to their local communities.
Take Jake Jabs, the 95-year-old CEO of American Furniture Warehouse, a business he bought for just $80,000 in 1975. When he bought $1.5 million in assets for that amount, the company was headed for bankruptcy, but he built it into an empire across Colorado, Arizona, and Texas with 18 locations. American Furniture Warehouse remains privately held and family-operated, and pulled in roughly $858 million in revenue in 2025, making it one of the largest private companies in Colorado.
And now he’s sharing his business success with local nonprofits; he recently told CBS News. In the past year, he’s given more than $1 million to charities across Colorado.
It’s a full-circle moment for Jabs, who said he grew up poor.
“I saw a lot of poverty,” he said. “I’ve traveled to 50 countries, and I see a lot of poverty, so I like to give to charity and things that help people and live them out of poverty.” This year, he earned the American Red Cross Heroism Award, which goes to “ordinary people with extraordinary courage,” and the Volunteers of America Good Samaritan Award, which goes to recipients who “embody compassion, generosity and selflessness in their communities.” Both honors are typically reserved for local firefighters, nurses, and bystanders who step up in a crisis, not CEOs.
While Jabs has said donating effectively is “complicated,” he told the American Red Cross “you have to give to people who know what they’re doing.” He’s given to organizations focused on disaster relief, hospitals, veterans’ organizations, disability services, food banks, global health efforts, and more. He’s also a longtime supporter of CBS Colorado’s Wednesday’s Child program, which works to find homes for children in foster care.
His biggest bets, though, have been on education. In 2011, Jabs gave an unrestricted $25 million gift to Montana State University’s business college, then the largest private gift in the history of Montana’s higher education system. The school renamed it the Jake Jabs College of Business & Entrepreneurship, and a portion of the money built a new home, Jabs Hall.
Two years later, he pledged $10 million to the University of Colorado Denver Business School, which was also the largest gift in that school’s history at the time. That gift launched the Jake Jabs Center for Entrepreneurship.
The reason Jabs gives is personal. He grew up one of nine children on a farm near Lodge Grass, Montana, in a house without indoor plumbing, electricity, or running water.
“My own life experience leads me to believe this is where my efforts can do the most good,” he said of the Montana State gift. “I think of all the students who might come from circumstances like mine, and I want to help them.”
And Jabs isn’t slowing down to enjoy the fruits of his labor. At 95, Jabs still works six days a week.
“If you enjoy what you’re doing, you may never work another day in your life,” he told NBC. “But there are other reasons. You have to have a purpose, and I have a purpose.”
