Rick Richards

I’m writing to express my appreciation for the leadership and support your firm provided the First Unitarian Church of Providence with its recently concluded strategic campaign.

I have been a member of the church for over forty years and have been through two capital campaigns.  The campaign your firm helped us conduct is by far the most thoughtful, inclusive, and rigorous fundraising effort we have ever implemented.

The materials that were developed for the campaign were of professional quality and, importantly, clearly articulated the church’s needs and its hopes for its future. This created a powerful tool for people like myself to use when asking for financial commitments from fellow parishioners.

I also appreciate the way I was tutored in making the case for a financial commitment and then partnered with more seasoned fundraisers for my first few ventures.  I always felt supported and found the process of interacting with the congregation very rewarding.

Finally, I was impressed at how thorough the campaign was. We have over four hundred people listed as potential donors and we contacted each and every one.  I have led the commitment campaign in our church–our annual effort to fund our operating budget—several times and I understand how hard it is to reach all the people in the congregation.  Usually, we don’t and, in fact, this campaign is the only time I have seen serious effort given to our small and occasional donors.  It was a herculean effort and it will benefit us as a congregation by creating a greater sense of solidarity.

In fact, while the most tangible benefit of the campaign was money, the intangible benefit of the impact we had on ourselves in the effort to raise money was large and worthwhile. I am grateful to your firm for providing the expertise you have developed from of your accumulated fundraising and for the tangible energy and talent of our Klote consultant. He was an indispensable component of this process.  He was always present and kept the process moving ahead at all times. It was a full-time job and one we could not have done ourselves—without him and on our own, I believe our efforts would have been far less successful.

Thank you for your winning formula and for our consultant!