One Million Dollars for La Casa

As we wrap up the year I get reflective, and one of my goals for next year is to celebrate milestones better. So I was looking at the La Casa budget, and realized... hey... I raised over a $1,000,000 dollars so far! I need to celebrate that somehow, so I figured I'd blog about it.

Historically La Casa would do about $150k annually in grants, and about $60-80k in contributions and event fundraising. At that pace it would take five years to raise a million dollars.

So how did we raise a million in three years? It was just over $700,000 raised in grant writing, we broke $200,000 in contributions, and events have raised nearly $250,000. Yes I know its well over a million, but I haven't been keeping track...

What is great about this is that it doesn't include pledged out gifts and multiyear grants. We have nearly $300k in pledged receivables.

So am I writing this to brag? No, well, maybe a little, lets be honest I am really proud of the work happening at La Casa and proud to be a cog in that machine.

I am writing about how we did it... it is something I learned as an engineer and that I taught students while working in higher education. Do Something Different. Don't look at what everyone else is doing and try to improve it; look at your problem, think about it from a user perspective, and design a solution.

So how did we do it? Without giving away all the tactics...

When grant writing, we asked for what we needed. We didn't double the budget, throw lots of padding in there, make up things we don't need hoping to get the things we do need. How is it working? Well so far four grants that we have written actually got more than we asked for! What? I didn't know that was a thing, but has been lately.

When doing appeals we do it our way. As a donor to several orgs, I hate "appeal season" because my mailbox is packed tight with fancy and expensive appeals. So this year, we sent a holiday card, that said Thank You and Merry Christmas. Are we broke? Nope, so why say it in a letter because I am supposed to? But could we use more money, absolutely.

Guess what happened? Typical donors gave, and we landed a few more through our continued promotion of what we do, our mission, our programs, our kids, our clients... and we saved all the paper, postage, and time spent on creating an appeal.

Our "You're Welcome" Post HERE

Several people thanked us for the card we sent, and a couple thanked for not sending an appeal. So we posted a "You're Welcome" message on our website.

Guess what happened? We are going to have a record December. And we had a record November, and record Giving Tuesday (300% over last year).

I know some of this is linked to a good economy, but I also think we are building a new track record of trustraising. Its maybe one of the things I am most proud of at La Casa, the trust we are building with donors, volunteers and supporters. People know where we stand, and we know who we can count on, and we aren't pushy.

Fundraising isn't sales, and I hate analogies to it being like sales. We are friendraising, trustraising, supportraising, causeraising, but we sure aren't sales.

Well there are some of my secrets. It wasn't just me, it was the incredible team at La Casa that got it all done this year. While I know that 2017 will for sure be an interesting year, full of uncertainty and obstacles, we are ready, and together we will best our challenges.

Thank you everyone for your support and your trust. The next million we will raise in half the time, and continue to grow and meet our critical mission.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!