How I Raised $700 Million: Charity: Water Founder: Scott Harrison | E153

Harrison tried moderating his vices—smoking less, doing fewer drugs, easing out of an unhealthy relationship—but repeatedly failed while still embedded in New York nightlife. It was only when he physically left the city, spent time alone in nature (driving north, then staying in the French Pyrenees), and then boarded a hospital ship with 350 humanitarian volunteers that he could go completely cold turkey on cigarettes, drugs, gambling, pornography, and casual sex. The lesson: if you’re trying to change deeply ingrained behavior, redesign your physical and social environment rather than relying on willpower alone.

Growing up as an only child caring for a severely ill, chemically sensitive mother left Harrison with anger and a sense of deprivation around fun and normalcy. He acknowledges a quick temper and deep discontent with how things are, but deliberately channels that energy toward fighting needless suffering and lack of clean water. Instead of trying to erase his dark side, he reframes it as fuel for meaningful, sustained social impact.

Harrison’s core competence was promotion—curating fun, generating buzz, filling nightclubs. On Mercy Ships, he realized he could apply exactly the same skill set to tell stories of surgical transformations, email his 15,000-strong club list, mount photo exhibitions, and raise funds. Later, he used the same promotional instincts to make charity: water a visually compelling, emotionally resonant, ‘fun’ brand rather than a guilt-driven one. The practical takeaway: ask how your current skills (sales, design, tech, ops) can be re-aimed at a problem that matters.

Talking to friends in media, fashion, and finance, Harrison found their main barrier to giving was distrust: “Where does the money really go?” His solution was structural—a two-bank-account model where 100% of public donations fund water projects and a separate group of 131 entrepreneurs and business leaders underwrite all overhead. This ‘church and state’ separation is independently audited and never crossed, even under payroll crisis, preserving integrity and making the value proposition extremely clear to donors.

Eighteen months in, charity: water had nearly $1M in the ‘water’ account but couldn’t meet payroll for nine staff. Advisors urged him to temporarily borrow from project funds and ‘IOU’ it back. He refused, believing even $1 misused would crack the foundation of trust. As he was preparing to shut down, entrepreneur Michael Birch unexpectedly wired $1M into the overhead account, buying 13 months of runway. That decision not to compromise, even when no rescue was visible, became one of the brand’s defining strengths and a magnet for future high-trust donors.