ACS' Big, Bold Move

This month’s cover story is the first installment in Angie’s coverage of the ACS move. We ran it in Today in Fundraising, as well, because we believe it really is that important. In an Agitator blog post after the story appeared online, veteran direct-mail and fundraising powerhouse Roger Craver praised ACS for having the courage to share its journey with its nonprofit peers, as well as for embarking on the journey at all.

The world of fundraising is anything but stagnant. But change doesn’t always come easily. Or painlessly. Even — and, in some cases, especially — the largest, most established and venerable organizations have to take a chance. Maybe they even have to take a hit, and that may well be the case for ACS. But, as you’ll read in Angie’s story in this issue, the organization did its homework, calculated the risk, battened down the hatches and took the leap.

We join Roger in applauding ACS’ ballsy move in the face of the changing and increasingly challenging fundraising landscape. And we’ll ask his closing question again: What are you doing to challenge the same-old same-old?