Disabled American Veterans

Several nonprofits that use for-profit companies to collect donated goods say that they will look more closely at such arrangements, following a Minnesota decision that called for Savers LLC to change its business practices.

Minnesota’s Attorney General’s Office filed a compliance report in November stating that "Savers mixes its identity with that of the charities and fails to disclose the amount of a donor’s donation that is received by the charity versus the amount that is retained by Savers, a for-profit corporation."

A for-profit thrift store chain that works with charities to collect used items for resale regularly fails to disclose to donors how much of their gifts goes to charitable causes and how much of them are retained as profit, the Minnesota attorney general charged in a report released Monday.

Savers LLC earns more than $1 billion annually from sales at its 330 stores in the United States, Canada and Australia. It solicits donations of clothing and household goods on its own and through several charities, including some in Minnesota.

"Fundraising is storytelling," as Brian Cowart, chief development officer at Disabled American Veterans, said yesterday during his sit-down Q&A with Chelsea Clinton at the DMA Nonprofit Federation's 2014 New York Nonprofit Conference.

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Announcing the 2014 FundRaising Success Fundraising Professionals of the Year Awards winners.

When veterans’ nonprofit group Disabled American Veterans sends a mailing for contributions, Dr. Robert Cialdini, professor emeritus of psychology and marketing at Arizona State University, said, it gets an 18 percent response rate. When the same letter is sent with personalized address labels, which cost about eight cents, the response rate goes up to 35 percent. “For the cost of the address labels they get almost a doubling of return,” he said. “It’s very powerful rule and very small things can trigger it.”

Go big or go small, either way … but in fundraising, and perhaps as it should be also in life, it's not only "the thought that counts," but also what you do with your idea and how creatively you follow through.

Make sure those thumb-through folks see your important direct-mail components first … so they turn into content-pullers and engage with you.

Over the course of about six weeks, I received member/partner/supporter cards from 18 different organizations.

The ball drops in Times Square, and next thing you know, Chez Seville is lousy with membership cards. Over the course of about six weeks, I received member/partner/supporter cards from 18 different organizations.