Giving to get: the new face of fundraising

Published 1:00 pm Sunday, January 2, 2005

Community groups, businesses are teaming up to raise money for local causes, projects.

When the rain stopped, sales increased for junior rowers selling bags of coffee at the crosswalk outside Blackbird Bakery on a Sunday morning.

Ariana Alexander paused at the tent with Grounds for Change’s “fair trade” product, for which the Bainbridge Island Rowing Club earned 40 cents on the dollar for each bag sold.

“I’m looking for gifts that benefit others – not just things out of stores,” Alexander said, when asked why she chose to buy a couple of bags. “That (coffee) fit my standards for gift-buying this year.”

Today there are more and more shoppers like Alexander. A survey by marketing consultant Cone Inc. found that 71 percent of shoppers this holiday season considered a company’s reputation for supporting causes when making holiday purchases.

And busi­nesses partnering with nonprofit groups – raising funds for causes and projects, while in­­creasing their own sales volume – is a growing trend among island merchants.

Recent examples include the Bain­bridge Ed­ucation Support Team’s BEST Night Out with island restaurants and merchants; a Town & Country effort in which 5 percent of proceeds over three days went to Helpline House; and an M&M Deli/76 promotion that gave two cents to the new Children’s Museum per gallon of gas pumped in November.

Fund-raising efforts have increased as dollars from government and other sources have waned. The animal welfare group PAWS saw its support from a private foundation – an annual contribution for 10 years – disappear altogether this year.

With greater need, there is more competition. In November 1999, the Review’s Calendar and articles listed nine fund-raising events or appeals. This past November, that number was 32.

Islander Jean Atwater has been counting the number of appeals – both locally and from national organizations – she’s received in person or via mail this year, and counted 42 as of Dec. 5.

“There’s a lot of groups competing for funds, and it’s pretty hard because they’re all worthy,” said Natalie Davidson, a parent organizing the junior rowers’ fund-raising coffee sales.

Davidson has been involved with fund-raising for 10 years on the island, for every club her son has been involved with.

The annual Hyla School chili cook-off is successful, but limited by the amount of chili local merchants can afford to donate. Events like auctions end up drawing largely on an organization’s own members.

“You end up bleeding your members dry,” she said, “so I thought it made sense to look outside the club.”

Katherine Hanson, the parent of another rower, agreed: “Cert­ainly on this island, you tap the same people over and over again, so that’s hard.”

So the junior rowers partnered with the Grounds for Change, a family coffee-roasting operation that was started on Bainbridge Island in 2003 and moved to Suquamish earlier this year.

David­son says the mutually beneficial approach of a merchant donating a portion of sales, is a way to expand the base of givers beyond the immediately connected families.

Yet while local businesses are known for their generosity, even they can be “overasked.”

Bainbridge Bakers estimates it is asked to participate in fund-raising activities three to four times a week. Blackbird Bakery averages four requests a month, from as far away as Bremerton and Seattle.

Town & Country receives a startling two to six requests a day, a number that has at least doubled in the last six years, said store director Lyla Derosier.

Margaret Kirk, buyer for Winslow Hardware says they are “inundated” with requests for donations. Compared to five years ago, she said, the store has seen the number of inquiries double to about two a week.

Savvy sellers

The current trend, “cause-related marketing” lets businesses give – and customers and organizations get – without sapping either.

When M&M Deli/76 donated two cents per gallon pumped during November to the new Children’s Museum, nearly $2,500 was raised.

M&M owner Matt Randish, a regular supporter of student-related activities, suggested the idea to the Children’s Museum organization.

For his small business, it was a lot of money to donate in one month, but he said it’s the best money he’s spent, better than advertising even.

“The main thing I heard is it made (customers) feel like a part of the giving to the Children’s Museum,” Randish said.

In the highly competitive gas business, where profits are counted in pennies on the gallon, Randish says he won’t be sure until year-end accounting whether the campaign significantly increased sales. But he thinks the station averaged an additional 300 gallons a day; compared to November 2003, when prices were lower, he would have expected sales to be down this year.

Especially in a commodity businesses, being seen as a cause-supporter can give a merchant a “goodwill” edge on the competition.

“As time goes on, it will help,” Randish said. “I feel it.”

Also, offering something the consumer was going to buy anyway makes the cause-oriented purchase less of a financial hit to individuals.

Doreen Morgan was persuaded to buy a few bags of coffee by a rowing parent friend as she walked to the bookstore. She reasoned her purchase thusly:

“I like coffee,” she said, “so this is fine. It will keep, and I can enjoy it in bed with my newspaper.”

Said Hanson, “It’s a whole new way to tap into businesses, but it’s not them giving, giving, giving, but also getting more business.”

Essential to successful cause-related marketing is the informed consumer. One study found that 48 percent of U.S. consumers have been motivated in the past to change brands, use a product more, try new products or get information about new products because they were linked with a cause. Nearly 90 percent of teens said they would switch brands for a good cause if price and quality were equal.

Paws and Fins pet shop, which Wiccan York-Patten and her husband took on seven years ago, now offers shop space and staff time for PAWS cat adoptions, as they are personally committed to pet adoptions.

York-Patten says it’s a mutually beneficial relationship, as her store competes with supermarkets as the vendor of pet supplies.

The adoptions “put us in good standing with people who don’t normally shop at a pet shop,” York-Patten said. “A lot of people adopted a cat five to six years ago and they still come and continue to come. It really does make a difference. It makes a really different relationship – more personal.”

York-Patten said an important part is consumers being much more aware of animal welfare than in the past.

Adopting families appreciate that PAWS spays and neuters its cats, and has them checked out for disease, not true of every purebred from a pet store.

Kelsey Marshall, president of Grounds for Change coffee, says he believes consumers like to vote with their dollars even if they may feel disenfranchised in voting.

For his company as well, Marshall believes helping the rowing club raise money will help people be more aware of their product when they see it in the local supermarket.

“The nice thing about cause-related marketing is… it’s been a tough road for the merchants on the island and cause-related marketing goes outside of the parameters of the institution,” DeVlieger said.

“It’s a shame that things can’t be funded the way they were before.”