By Joyce Penland, CFRE
As nonprofits celebrate the holiday season and the close of 2013, many make an effort to include donors in the mix. Some invite donors and prospects to make an additional end-of-year gift. Others send special Christmas cards to donors and friends. Here’s a sampling of what some Bacon Lee & Associates clients and friends are undertaking this holiday season.
At San Antonio Academy, donors receive a thank you card featuring artwork created by one of the students during the school’s annual art fair. The card’s message, thanking donors for their support throughout the year, along with the charming artwork, inspires donors to keep SAA in their year-end thoughts. Additionally, the boys participate in gift giving to other charities, according to Director of Development Mary Shrader.
Each grade selects a charity and brings gifts ranging from toys for the Sonny Melendrez Foundation, to art supplies for the Children’s Shelter, to socks and underwear for Catholic Worker House. In addition, the entire school contributes canned goods to support the San Antonio Food Bank. Shrader says Sonny Melendrez visits SAA to speak to students and personally thank them for their generosity. “It reminds the students about what the holidays are all about.”
At Texas State Aquarium, where Rocky Kettering is Vice President of Development, the whole community is the beneficiary during the holidays. Kettering says TSA offers $1 admission several days in December. Recently, during a cold snap in Corpus Christi, several families took advantage of “dollar day” at the Aquarium. As families enjoyed several types of aquatic life native to Texas, numerous people received a free Santa hat for their visit. With the Artic blast, TSA staff had to make special arrangements to assure all of its marine life was kept safe.
During holiday season at the McNay Art Museum, members receive an email offering museum discounts and exhibits. Members enjoy a holiday “double discount” at the Museum Store, including an extensive selection of art and theatre books. In addition, Chief Development Officer Colleen Kelly says that the McNay will be showing “a family favorite” The Nightmare Before Christmas in the Tobin Theatre Arts Galleries. She shared that the McNay admission is always free on Thursdays from 4-9 p.m. courtesy of HEB.
Each year at Seminary of the Southwest in Austin, members of the broader Southwest family contribute meditations and prayers for each day of the Advent season. These reflections are collected and published in booklet and digital form and dispersed to the Southwest family of alumni, friends and supporters. Tara Holley, Vice President of Advancement, explained that each meditation is recorded by its author and then placed on the seminary’s website (www.ssw.edu/advent2013), which is also referenced in daily Twitter and Facebook updates by the school. The project, now in its fifth year, reaches thousands of people around the world and helps raise more than 15 percent of Southwest’s annual fund. Holley says the Advent Meditations booklet that goes out to 6,000 friends, alums and donors is similar to a Christmas card “but it is one that keeps on giving all through Advent leading up to Christmas.”
SSW also includes personal visits, lunches and simple gifts to its leadership donors with an emphasis on those who are very elderly and not able to get out. SSW’s Dean and the Advancement staff participates in this effort to at least 50 individuals and families, some long-supporters of the school. Says Holley, “Everyone receives the Advent Mediation booklet. However, we spend every extra moment during the month of December reaching out to those who make a difference in the life of the Seminary throughout the year.”
What traditions are important to your organization? Let us hear about your special customs and we’ll include them in a future article. Email us at jpenland@baconlee.com