St Mary Redcliffe Fundraising Feasibility Study

ST MARY REDCLIFFE
FUNDRAISING FEASIBILITY STUDY
BACKGROUND
1. In the last week of August, the St Mary Redcliffe Development Board called for tenders
for a fundraising feasibility study. The church had a grand vision for the development of
three themes: heritage, community and worship. The total bill was projected at £22
million.
2. This consultancy duly submitted a proposal which, after interview on Friday 9
September, led to appointment as the chosen consultancy. The proposal predicted 14
days of service at a cost of £7,000 plus VAT, with expenses not exceeding £2,000 plus
VAT (total £10,800). In the event, the total cost of the project has been just £8,500
including VAT.
3. The study has delved into five areas of importance: the case for support, the financial
justification, the constituency of support, appeal leadership, and the processes and
management procedures to run a major appeal.
THE CASE FOR SUPPORT AND FINANCIAL JUSTIFICATION
4. This initiative is ambitious. According to the Bishop, the financial target is at least four
times the scale of any previous ecclesiastical appeal in the area. The biggest
ingredients are:
a. North-side Building - £6,852,200
b. South Churchyard Building - £1,417,900 – faith led hospitality -
c. Prewett Street Community Building - £6,076,600 – doctors surgery, offices, multi
storey…wholly separate from the main heritage
5. On top of that, a further £8 million is needed to cover fees, fittings, VAT and revenue
costs over a number of years.
.
6. The consultancy has spoken to the architects, senior planning officials, councillors,
known philanthropists, businessmen and women, volunteer leaders and professional
fundraising staff engaged with the other major appeals of the past four years, members
of the Anglican, Catholic and Methodist clergy from the Bishop to parish priests,
volunteers in St Mary Redcliffe and passers-by in the street. On the issue of potential
support from the USA, we have spoken to charity professionals in New York,
Washington and San Fransisco. Several considerations distil out of their thinking.
7. The Target. £22 million is a very, very big ask. Senior volunteers and professional staff
who worked on recent major appeals (Wallace & Gromit, The Old Vic, Colston Hall, St
George’s, and the Golden Gift Appeal) expressed grave doubts. None of their appeals
secured major gifts from individuals in the range of £100,000 to multi millions. The Old
Vic campaign did well thanks to the scheme in which they delivered actors to talk to
wealthy Americans in New York. This success is likely to tempt people to consider that a
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great deal of money can be raised from the USA, but American philanthropists justly
respond that they have plenty of people to support at home.
8. While it is true that there are organisations and systems for Americans to give overseas,
there is little or no evidence that St Mary Redcliffe is uniquely qualified or likely to be a
beneficiary. The cost / benefit ratio of pursuing prospects three thousand miles away is
going to be an investment which compares unfavourably with local activity. Five
contributors to this study, two of them in Bristol and three in the USA, said that they
could imagine a measure of success if ‘Bristol’, rather than organisations bidding
independently, were to develop a city-wide initiative. The alleged strength of links with
the USA is undermined by the fact that Bristol has twinning arrangements in Europe,
Asia, Africa and South America, but none with North America. There is an argument for
seeking a twinning arrangement for the City of Bristol with either Harrisburg (the state
capital of Pennsylvania), or Philadelphia (its largest city).
9. The major appeals that have dominated the City’s affairs in recent years have done well
to prosper at the same time. But it was interesting to learn that gifts of £100,000 or more
from individuals have been extremely rare. Most of the success has come from statutory
sources giving multiple millions. The Arts Council and the Heritage Lottery Fund have
been by far the largest financial supporters.
10. Wallace and Gromit did very well in 2014 thanks to £2.5 million being raised at an
auction, and a gift of £500,000 from a trust. Over 21 years, they have raised £40 million.
The Old Vic appeal was clever to introduce the silver and gold tickets because it
produced more than 50 individuals or families who gave £50,000 apiece. (As an aside,
most big gift professional fundraisers hesitate to deploy a strategy to persuade people to
give equal sums because that may well persuade a wealthier donor not to give more.)
11. The cost of raising the money. Three of the biggest appeals demonstrate that you
have to invest money to raise it.
Wallace &
Gromit
2012 2013 2014 2015 TOTAL
Fundraising 1,002,527 1,262,231 7,360,709 5,049,737 14,675,204
Costs 171,935 368,387 2,393,981 3,160,739 6,095,042
Cost Ratio 17.2% 29.2% 32.5% 62.6% 41.5%
Old Vic
Fundraising 5,576,326 4,694,226 3,237,369 3,454,683 16,962,604
Costs 653,796 626,531 724,754 881,397 2,886,478
Cost Ratio 11.7% 13.3% 22.4% 25.5% 17%
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Colston Hall
Fundraising 1,645,137 1,604,066 1,738,332 1,861,033 6,848,568
Costs 496,132 506,001 715,446 688,591 2,406,170
Cost Ratio 30.2% 31.5% 41.2% 37% 35.1%
12. Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF). All the clergy approached for their insight feared the
impact of HLF, noting that the quest for a large grant generally forced applicants to grow
their plans out of proportion to the original idea. Moreover, money tends to be paid
retrospectively, which forces applicants to secure outside funding first.
13. Individuals who work frequently with HLF warned that a bid for £10 million could not be
guaranteed, despite the evident importance of St Mary Redcliffe. The factors affecting
success could not be managed by the applicant and it is entirely possible that the very
best submission could fail on the day because of a lack of available money in that round,
or other applications which trumped St Mary Redcliffe. £5 million was judged to be a
good outcome.
14. But whatever the cost, the heritage ingredient of this campaign is widely recognised as a
valuable and desirable initiative which is likely to receive support. It is strong enough to
stand on its own merits.
15. Factors affecting the plan. Part of the plan is that Redcliffe Way should be moved
northwards towards the car park on the far side of the road. Very senior planning
officials admitted that this was extremely unlikely to happen. It transpires that there are
many underground services which would be too difficult to move, and the format of the
traffic system is now so embedded that Highways England are most unlikely to consider
tampering with the trunk road. Moreover, there was no money available to undertake
the work. The architects are well aware of this impediment and they say that it does not
seriously affect their plans.
16. Community development. The community ingredient of the vision has its own
challenges. The Methodist church is supportive, but protective of its own culture and
ideas. They do not wish to actively pursue every aspect of the existing proposals. One
way of overcoming that may be the purchase of the entire building in which St Mary
Redcliffe has some equity, turning it into an Anglican, rather than ecumenical project. In
a curious way, the building, rather than any service delivery, seems to be driving the
financial commitments.
17. Two senior prelates suggested that there was a suspicion that the community aspects of
the £22 million target were added to bolster the case, rather than satisfy a need.
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18. Social Services acknowledge the church’s fundamental mission to engage with their
community, but they were very surprised by the £6 million price tag of the plan, saying
that they were ‘not confident that this would be the best return on capital,’ adding
‘A £1 million injection of funding would be very agreeable because the Council are
looking for more property to service social welfare issues. Cutbacks are preventing them
from achieving the aim. Outside help would be fantastic’.
19. Social Services have the statutory duty to provide, while the church expresses a moral
obligation. The deduction is that a £6 million project may be significantly out of
proportion to the need. And this is important to resolve because donors will need to be
convinced. At this stage, prospective donors are not excited with the plan. Arguably the
whole community development plan should be driven by Social Services, with the
church and other established agencies in support.
20. On the other hand, given detailed scrutiny and common consent that an investment will
satisfy a genuine need, there are funders who will contribute to community support at
the right level with social funding.
21. The Worship element of the campaign is harder to define. There are no specific financial
predictions in the project workbook, other than the construction of the south side
building. The arguments for introducing this building are quite strong and it would clearly
help the bridge building vision. On the other hand, it is a distraction from the very strong
appeal of the heritage initiative. The Vicar has said that he sees no need for the
development of worship to be included in the appeal.
22. In sum, those who contributed their thinking to this study felt that St Mary Redcliffe
would be applauded for its heritage intentions and, while there is recognition of the sense
of obligation to the community, the predicted spending was judged to be
disproportionate to the likely benefits. Some argue that this is a distraction from the main
purpose of a heritage appeal.
THE CONSTITUENCY
23. In 2014 Bristol's gross domestic product was £30.502 billion. Its per capita GDP was
£46,000, which was some 65% above the national average, the third highest of any
English city (after London and Nottingham) and the sixth highest of any city in the United
Kingdom (behind London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Belfast and Nottingham) Bristol's
unemployment rate has no recent measure, but the South West is 3.8% compared with
5.1% for the whole United Kingdom.
24. Bristol is wealthy, despite the unexpected and shocking pockets of deprivation. There
are many directors with multi-million pound remuneration packages, and there is an
extremely strong sense of community attachment. Business is buoyant. Superficially, an
ambitious appeal should coast to success.
25. There are some very interesting measures of potential;
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a. The Charity Commission lists some 700 charitable organisations in Bristol. More
than 340 – just under half – have gone into liquidation. By and large, the remainder
are quite small. Of these, none of the larger ones appears to have received very
large gifts from individuals in recent years.
b. One of the highest paid directors in Bristol may be giving very secretly but no
commentator was aware of it and they asserted that the individual did not participate
in Bristol’s affairs as a volunteer.
c. One very experienced commentator says that there is a profound difference between
Bath and Bristol. Bath has some six philanthropists who regularly give sums over
£100,000. Bristol’s donors tend to give often, but much smaller sums. Direct
questions to several well-known donors strongly suggested that they would not
consider gifts over £100,000 (and one of these benefitted from dividends of more
than £17,000,000 in 2015). On the other hand, another commentator with an insight
to effective fundraising asked the question ‘but has anyone actually asked them to
give at the higher levels?’ The answer to that is a qualified ‘yes’. This has revealed a
very discreet level of donors who do indeed give more than £100,000. The challenge
is that for this campaign to succeed without an HLF grant, it must secure at least 63
gifts between £50,000 and £3 million, with the average being £525,000.
d. If HLF were to commit £5 million, the table of giving could start with a leading local
gift of £2 million and there would have to be 73 donors giving in the range of £50,000
to £2 million with an average of £236,364. And if HLF committed £10 million, the
campaign would have to look for 47 donors with an average gift of £255,319.
26. The reality is that even with a £10 million grant from HLF, at least 47 other significant
donors are needed and we have been unable to find that number with the capacity, let
alone the will, to give at the required level to secure £22 million. Reviewing all of the
known sources, we believe that £10 million can be raised without worrying about HLF. If
observers are accurate and HLF contributes £5 million, a total of £15 million is
achievable.
LEADERSHIP
27. People give to people, rather than to ‘things’. They give to people that they know, like,
trust, respect and wish to please. Given best practice (peer-to-peer, face-to-face), the
leadership team should do well. They would be wise to accept professional support from
a big gift specialist. The specialist is not there to ask for the money, but to serve as a
facilitator, adviser on tax effective giving, and appeal manager.
28. Bristol is a very intimate city – some have said ‘incestuous’. If the right leaders are
engaged, the chances of success are very high. It must be said that whenever Merchant
Venturers put their shoulder to the charitable wheel, they secure the best results. And in
this instance, Mike Bothamley has undertaken to lead the campaign. He is well known,
highly regarded, a Merchant Venturer, successful professional lawyer, and former High
Sheriff recognised for his years of senior leadership roles for causes and organisations in
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Bristol. He has clear ideas of the people he wants to join him on an Appeal Board, and
their standing is excellent.
29. It does no harm to repeat the evidence of best practice. Appeal leaders must give, and
give in proportion to their ability. This does not necessarily mean the giving must be
sacrificial, but it must be serious and, by definition, be a leading and leaders
commitment. When appeal leaders decline to give, they would be better deployed on
another activity because those that do not give very rarely persuade others to do so.
PROCESSES
30. The church is not ready to run a major appeal. The computer system and databases are
totally inadequate at present. We understand that the operations manager is
investigating church friendly software, and he has been informed about Salesforce
(http://www.salesforce.org/.) who will provide up to ten free licences for their online
fundraising database system. It will take a real investment in time and money to bring
record keeping and report availability up to speed. There is also some ground to be
made up in terms of stewardship. Let it be acknowledged that no commentator was
‘huffy’ or upset, but those that had been donors to the organ appeal in 2010 did comment
that after making their gift, a formal letter of thanks had been the final contact. There
had not been any attempt to engage the donors and keep them ‘fresh’ for further
support.
31. The fundraising cost ratios in paragraph 11 are cited in this study because they provide
some of the evidence needed to persuade the Development Board that the £322,000
predicted expenditure over five years is unrealistic. It represents 1.5% of a £22 million
target and 2.1% of a £15 million target. In fairness, the appeals that are quoted in
paragraph 11 relied very heavily on event based fundraising, where national average
cost ratios amount to something in the range 33% - 44%. A major campaign merits
proper investment and the logic of this is presented in the Fundraising Strategy and Plan.
CONCLUSIONS
32. The Case for Support and Financial Justification. The appeal target of £22 million is
too ambitious and it does not wholly withstand scrutiny. The heritage element is strong,
apparently costing what experts would expect and seen to be a worthy initiative. The
construction of the south side building has good arguments on its side, but it does
distract attention from the main thrust of the initiative. The community ingredient is seen
to be much more costly that is justified by the need and potential supporters will object.
There is a sense that the three objectives should be treated separately, with the
community plans being scaled to size, driven by the statutory authorities and paid for
through social funding.
33. The Constituency. Bristol is relatively wealthy and has higher than national average
wages. There are many executives who are extremely well remunerated. Some play
little or no part in the life of the City although the majority are dedicated to Bristol’s
prosperity and success. If there are donors who regularly provide gifts in excess of
£100,000, they keep themselves well hidden. Bristolians do give regularly, but the size
of the gifts tends to be below six figures. This may well be because nobody asks for the
higher sums (professional ‘big gift’ fundraisers exist to raise the standards). A detailed
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study of recent appeals and the activity of leading local charities strongly suggests that
the City will not produce the minimum number of individuals (47) needed to deliver £22
million.
34. On the other hand, we believe that £10 million can be raised without the backing of the
Heritage Lottery Fund. If they agreed to a £5 million commitment, that would amply
satisfy the heritage objectives.
35. Leadership. The Development Board has the benefit of precisely the right leadership
qualities and the commitment of its chairman has been established for some time.
Provided they apply best practice, they should achieve the desired results.
36. Processes. The parish is not in a position to launch a major appeal at this moment.
They are moving in the right direction, having appointed an operations manager to create
the conditions for effective data management and stewardship. There will be a need to
make an investment in software (and possibly hardware), with money and time set aside
for training and office resources.
RECOMMENDATIONS
37. The Development Board will wish to study the community element of the appeal to justify
its scope and costs.
38. They may find it beneficial to consider separating the heritage from the community
objectives with a view to focussing on developing their natural assets in a straightforward
heritage appeal for £10 million.
39. If the separation of objectives is agreed, Social Services, the Anchor Society and other
agencies will affirm their willingness to work together to plan and deliver the thrust of a
coherent plan in which the church will be an honoured partner.
40. The cultivation of potential major donors, which often takes a long time, can and should
start as soon as the shape of the appeal is agreed. This can be done by engaging with
the dozen or so individuals whose support would make the vision a reality. This is to
honour the Chinese proverb:
Tell me, I'll forget. Show me, I'll remember. Involve me, I'll understand
41. Investment in appeal management systems and a thorough overhaul of existing records
is the immediate imperative.
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