# “How many different types of fundraising are there?”

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2019/01/03/many-different-types-fundraising/
- Published: 2019-01-03T08:22:52+00:00
- Author: Giles Pegram CBE

**“I have a bit of a problem with this question. It seems to position fundraising
as an ‘activity’.”**
 A recent post on Facebook asked:

> “Friends, can you help me out?
> “I want to draw up a list of as many different types/disciplines of fundraising
> as I can think of. Legacies, Trusts & Foundations, Individual Giving, Community
> etc… Also, for a hypothetical charity starting from scratch, is there a usual/
> common process by which they would grow a fundraising strategy ie starting off
> with T&F fundraising, then adding corporate support capacity etc?”
> 
> ## Advertisement
> 

I responded:

> “Those who know me will understand why I have a bit of a problem with this question.
> It seems to position fundraising as an ‘activity’.
> “Let me give you an example. It is true, and far from unusual.

![Topshop window with NSPCC Full Stop campaign display](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.
cloud/2019/01/pegram-topshop-window.jpg)

_Topshop window with NSPCC Full Stop campaign display_

> “A High Street shopper sees a charity display in a shop window, and goes in and
> buys a specially designed t-shirt. She’s a donor. The people in the company who
> decided to partner with the charity are donors. They decided on the way to fundraise,
> not the charity. The designer who designed the t-shirt is a donor.
> “The Chair of the company was engaged by a major donor. The major donor’s wife
> chairs a local community fundraising committee. Of course, she is a donor.
> “And this thinking is not just for large charities. A small, local charity has
> more opportunities for this integrated approach to its supporters than a large
> national one.”

May I unpack this a bit?
 

![Troyes Cathedral](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2019/01/pegram-troyes-cathedral.
jpg)

_Troyes Cathedral_

 Of course, there are techniques. There always have been and there always will 
be. In the example I often quote of the building of Troyes cathedral starting in
1389, there are types of fundraising which we would recognise today: major gifts,
collecting boxes, regular gifts and corporate partnerships.

And there were some which we wouldn’t recognise: the sale of indulgences, the granting
of general pardons, funerals with different degrees of pomp, the sale of relics,
payments made for the remembrance of a donor in the form of prayers, or a Mass.

You may regard the selling of relics as _‘trading’_, but how would you categorise
the others?

And, although I don’t know it as a fact, there will have been different, paid, people,
with different skills, for them all. (The profession of fundraising is not new.)

And, and forgive me if I am stating the obvious, an Individual Giving fundraiser
today needs certain skills and experience. Testing of different creative approaches
with focus groups. Satisfaction surveys. Rigorous analysis and segmentation. All
as a means better to understand the donor.

(And so give the donor a better experience, and so raise more money and help more
beneficiaries. May I, now, take this as read?)

A corporate fundraiser will require quite different skills and experience. Indeed,
a corporate fundraiser _negotiating_ a partnership with the influencers in a company
will need different skills from those _delivering_ the partnership. (Is this contentious?)
But for both, their work is better to understand the donor.

So, different donors require different skill sets from the fundraisers who engage
with them.

⌊Coloured blocks pattern⌉⌊Coloured blocks pattern⌉ And, yes, there are different
sources of funds. I am deliberately not going to list the obvious ones, because 
they exclude the less obvious ones.

What about the t-shirt shopper, a donor, who I mentioned earlier? And where would
you place the National Association of Flower Arranging Societies, an enormous and
unknown organisation who gave very significantly to NSPCC’s Centenary Appeal? (Or
rather their members did.) And where would you place the collections via Football
Match programmes during the Full Stop Appeal, which involved several partnerships
with different people and different organisations, but where the actual money was
given by individual football team supporters?

And the Facebook post talked about _‘Trusts and Foundations’_. And most of us do.
But do we _all_ distinguish between family trusts, which in many cases are a vehicle
for a major donor/philanthropist (Is there a difference?) to give away money tax
effectively? And institutional trusts with their complicated application forms?

And do we believe that trustees, and trust administrators, can’t be influenced by
the experience they receive? I assure you; they can, despite trust administrators
stating absolutely they don’t. They do.
(If I have made my point, skip the next 
bit.)

**Retail.** Do you include jumble sales? Car boot sales in a stately home? A free,
short-term lease on a shop, run totally by volunteers? One of a chain of shops with
paid managers?

**Street fundraising**. Static collection boxes? The bucket collectors out in force
for Poppy Day, Daffodil Day, or the Macmillan World’s Biggest Coffee Morning? The
flag day collector? The paid street fundraiser recruiting new direct debits?

**Companies.** Collection boxes placed by volunteers in the local shop? A partnership
with a national company? Or a local company? Company donations? CSR initiatives?
Promotions? Sponsorship? Staff fundraising? Major individual gifts from top management?

**Door to door.** The traditional collections: volunteer committee members putting
envelopes through doors? Paid fundraisers signing up direct debits? Bob-a-job week?(
Now called Scout Community Week.)

**Mitzvah day.** And what about other religions and their fundraising?

**Volunteer committee fundraising.** In a village, though a cake sale raising £500?
A tiny charity with an ambitious fundraising committee which raises £50,000 from
an auction? A Volunteer committee for a £10m Appeal? Or a £250m Appeal? Or anything
in between?

**Challenge events. Mass participation events. Schools fundraising. Sponsored walks.
Rag weeks.** I could go on.

And I suggest none of these distinctions is real. They overlap.
 

![Mayor of London Sayed Khan makes a contactless donation. Photo: Tap London](https://
wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2018/12/TapToDonate_0011.jpeg)

_Mayor of London Sayed Khan makes a contactless donation._

 **And in the last ten years.** The growth of crowdfunding. And the ability to 
put a device into a shop window, or other window, which lets you donate, say, £5
for the cause simply by tapping your card on the outside of the window. It’s news
right now. ([UK Fundraising,  4th December 2018](https://fundraising.co.uk/2018/12/04/contactless-donation-points-installed-across-london-help-homeless/)).

Given the way fundraising has changed in the 50 years that I have been a fundraiser,
is there any reason to suppose it will change less in the next 50 years?

Or will the change be exponential, as it always has been in every walk of life? (
Scary; isn’t it?)
 ⌊Group of people standing shoulder to shoulder against a white
internal wall⌉(Please start reading again, now.)

Whether you talk about trusts, companies, major donors, community volunteers, marathon
runners, individual givers or whatever, you are talking about people.

Individuals with their own motivations. And, their own ways of wanting to engage,
financially, with our causes.

And whilst legacies is indeed a source of funds, they are left by individuals, who
may well be donors of some other form.

So, we should start with people. The only reason to talk about _“types/disciplines
of fundraising”_ is as a means to reach people.

Because we have to organise ourselves internally, we categorise these types of giving:_‘
Individual giving’, Community volunteers’, ‘Companies’_ etc. But these are merely
constructs to help us organise ourselves. They bear little resemblance to the real
world.

There are probably an infinite number of different types of donor, and an infinite
number of _“types/disciplines of fundraising.”_ (I exaggerate. Let’s just say _‘
lots’_.)

It might help if I address the second part of the original Facebook question.
 ⌊
Looking down at two feet with three different arrows painted on ground indicating
a choice of direction⌉ 

> “Also, for a hypothetical charity starting from scratch, is there a usual/common
> process by which they would grow a fundraising strategy ie starting off with T&
> F fundraising, then adding corporate support capacity etc?”

No, please. Don’t just start with T&F. Again, this is starting by talking about 
types/disciplines of fundraising, not starting with people.

So I would advise a different approach for the hypothetical charity.

1) Who are the founders? Who are the current trustees? What supporters do you have
already? Who else is engaged with the charity? Are they wealthy? Are they influential?
Where is their influence?

2) Where is your constituency of support? Do you have mass appeal, or are you very
niche?

3) Are you national, local, or very local?

4) Would you be able to set up a volunteer committee? At a grass roots level, organising
local events? Or at a level that could attract major gifts or company support? Or
somewhere in between? Or both?

5) What are you aiming for? What resource is available for fundraising? I’m sure
there are other questions. These are off the top of my head.

Once you have answered these questions, you need a plan. Three years? _Only then_
should you decide where to start.

Just to take a couple of examples.

If you are a hospice within a small community, you may well want to engage the members
of that community. The local businesses. Local organisations. The Mayor might help
you identify local wealth.

Start by inviting all these people to one gathering, at the hospice. Engage them.

If you have a slightly larger area, you might consider starting with the local community
foundation, and work out from there.

Or, you might indeed start with a programme of approaches to Trusts and Foundations.
But you will have gone through a process, with some rigour.

My conclusion is simple, and may seem obvious.
 ⌊Close-up of older woman with blue
eyes in contemplative mood⌉ Start with people. Your existing supporters and potential
supporters. Then decide, from the myriad of possibilities, how best to reach them.
But don’t structure your fundraising plan by starting with a list of types/disciplines
of fundraising.

You are you. You are unique. You are addressing a specific need. People and organisations
will want to engage with you, and support you.

Start there.
 Giles Pegram CBEConsultant15.xii.2018 

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