Funding Advice Bureau SYFAB guide to... Company giving Company giving Companies give to charity. But that’s not their main purpose. So companies often haven’t really thought through how they want to show their philanthropic sides. And they don’t often spend a lot of time working it all out. Some don’t do it at all. But lots of charities and community organisations benefi t (financially and otherwise) from relationships with companies. You can too. But to make sure you do, you should plan it carefully. This sheet is all about how to do that. The ethics of it all It’s really important for your organisation to be clear about your aims and what you are trying to achieve. This certainly goes for your fundraising, and is perhaps even more important when thinking about approaching companies for support. You should think about your values and ethos as an organisation and whether companies match up. Not just that, think about your image and what your service users, members, and supporters would think. For (an extreme) example, should an anti-smoking organisation accept a donation from British American Tobacco? As an organisation you need to balance your independence, integrity and image with the need to raise funding. It’s important to be aware of all the activities of the companies that you are applying to, so take some time to do your research as fully as you can. It’s worth recognising some of the reasons why companies give. Things like: • For goodwill in the community and amongst their customers and employees • For good publicity – being associated with a good cause • Someone in the company has a personal interest or involvement • Because it’s expected of them • To raise profile • Because things like staff volunteering programmes and team challenge days help the personal and professional development of company employees • Because they are legally obliged to, or there is a financial reason to do so, such as tax credits. For example, Landfill Communities Fund operators • Because you asked them to. What type of support do companies give? • Charitable foundations set up by the company which distribute a percentage of the company profi ts e.g. Lloyds TSB Foundation, Diageo Foundation • Companies giving direct cash donations – most likely to be capital funding, or one-off revenue costs, such as events. Ongoing running costs and salaries are far less likely • Sponsorship of an event or activity • Sponsorship of a thing – equipment, publication, room in a building, or the classic example: football kit • Gifts in kind – equipment, office space, other products e.g. B&Q give away building materials • Pro bono work – offering specialist services, or advice for free or at least a reduced rate • Employee volunteering • Advertising in charity publications. Which companies are likely to be interested in your organisation? This checklist will help you decide whether a company is likely to be interested in supporting your organisation: • Is your work somehow related to the work of the company? Examples might be banks supporting debt advice services, bookshops supporting literacy programmes. But don’t be constrained by the obvious – think creatively about how a company might be able to support you, and how that ties in to their main activities. • Is the company based in (or does it have a branch in) your local area? For the company, a key aim for supporting community activity is creating goodwill in the area they are working, so being a local organisation will defi nitely help. • Are you a size match? A massive national company won’t be that interested in funding a tiny, local organisation – they won’t really get the benefits of good PR. Annoyingly for all of us involved with small organisations, the reverse isn’t true – small companies can and often do give charitable donations to the ‘big brand’ charities • Do you have a connection with the company? Do any of your staff, trustees or volunteers (or families of any of those) work for the company, for example? Just like knowing the trustee of a charitable trust will help your application letter get a personal recommendation, the same is true for company giving. Where to find companies For small, local voluntary and community organisations, the best way of finding the names of companies likely to support you is offline. The best ways are: • Ask around – your staff, your volunteers, your trustees, your members, friends and family. What companies do they have links with? • Walk around – your local area. What businesses are there? What do they do? • Read around – your local newspapers, free sheets, community newsletters. These are all places where local companies advertise. And don’t forget the articles. In local newspapers, most of the articles come straight from press releases. And a good chunk of these press releases are from local companies after a bit of publicity. And there are some websites that can help you: • Yellow pages – www.yell.com • Thomson Local Directory – www.thomsonlocal.com • Some local chambers of commerce have free searchable directories of local businesses – www.britishchambers.org.uk • Business in the community – Per Cent Club and Community Index – www.bitc.org.uk • Arts and Business – www.aandb.org.uk • London Benchmarking Group – www.lbg-online.net And one service that isn’t free: The Company Giving website is the website version of the DSC printed directory of companies who give. Subscription starts from around £200 per year. The site only has information on 495 of the biggest companies, so not particularly good value, especially for smaller, local organisations Once you have found some names of companies, you should to do some research to find out more about them. Just like you would (or should!) research funders to help tailor your application and improve your chances of success, so you should research companies and plan your approach. A good start is to get onto the internet, search Google to see if the company has a website, and start collecting some details. Digging around company websites If companies do have established giving programmes, they often don’t seem to shout about them very much. It’s almost as if they don’t want to give lots of money away! Some companies will have policies and procedures that guide their charitable giving, but lots, especially smaller companies, will make it up as they go along. Here are some tips to help you find the links you’re looking for to get to that elusive information. Be warned, this can get very frustrating very quickly. That’s why we heartily recommend thinking about likely matches for your organisation before you dive in to the internet research. Ultimately, the section or the page of the website you are looking for will be called something like ‘Community involvement’, ‘Charitable programme’, ‘Corporate responsibility’ and is likely to be accessible through an ‘About us’ section, or maybe a ‘Corporate site’ section. But, a good short-cut is to make use of one of the many Google tips there are – this one allows you to use Google to search just within one specific website. It uses the site: command. Here’s how it works: Let’s say you’re trying to find out if Npower has a programme of charitable giving or community involvement. Go to www.google.co.uk, and in the search box enter the keyword you’re looking for (one of the following: ‘community’, ‘charitable’, ‘social responsibility’ – in our experience, ‘community’ is generally the most likely) followed by site: then the website address you want to search. So in our example, you would type the following into Google: community site:www.npower.com (no spaces between site: and the website address). This will give you search results just for the Npower website. Try it. It’s very clever. Here’s an example of how to navigate round a company website to find out what support they give – the bookseller Waterstone’s: • a Google search for Waterstone’s will find their website very quickly. You could probably have guessed the web address too – it’s www.waterstones.com • A look around the top of the home page doesn’t show any likely links – this is all aimed at Waterstone’s customers. But scroll down to the collection of links at the very bottom of the page. Under ‘About Waterstone’s’, you’ll see a link to ‘About us’. Click it • Next, you’ll see a collection of links on the navigation bar under the sub-heading ’Waterstone’s and CSR’. CSR stands for Corporate Social Responsibility, so one or more of these links could be helpful – the three that look most likely are ‘Community’, ‘Sponsorship programme’ and ‘Rainbow Trust’ • The sponsorship programme page tells you about the things that Waterstone’s has already committed to sponsoring, not how you could be sponsored. And the Rainbow Trust is the charity that Waterstone’s has as its charity partner, so this isn’t any help to us either. Clicking on ‘Community’ is more helpful. This page describes how local branches of Waterstone’s can support local causes (displaying collecting tins, donating their time in the form of a “Day for Good” or through the gift of books, vouchers or other products) and that this support is at the discretion of the local store manager, so that’s the person you need to contact and persuade. Another way of digging around company websites is to look for a Site Map. This shows you all the different pages on the website, and you can browse through to see if any pages look likely. How to maximise your chances of success • Be creative – think about what the company is likely to be interested in, think about what they could give easily, and then think of what benefits the company could get from supporting you • Ask nicely – sounds obvious, but charitable giving isn’t the aim of the company, so make sure your request is polite, explains the situation carefully and recognises that the person reading your request might know absolutely nothing about charities and community groups • Be concise – again, whoever picks up your request is likely be busy, so get to the point, and be brief • Be specific – make it easy on whoever reads your request by asking for something specific, just as you should always ask a grant-maker for a specifi c amount of money • Show them the benefit – tell them what they would get out of it as well as the benefits to you. And make it an attractive proposition for the company • Show some leverage – if you can show how some kind of small support from the company can help you have a big impact (for example, by acting as match funding), that’s attractive • Be accurate – make sure that the contact details you use are accurate, that you’re contacting the right person, and that you’re explaining the situation as clearly and precisely as you can • Offer more info – do be brief, but offer the company more information if they want it, tell them who to contact to receive more info, to discuss in more detail, or even to arrange a vist • Be persistent – if they turn you down, you can try again with something different in 6 months or a year. Unless the company says they don’t give to charity at all or don’t give to your type of organisation, then being persistent and getting your name recognised can pay off in the end. What to do if you’re successful? If you do get support from a company, here’s a few ways of making sure you capitalise on your success by building a good relationship with them: • Say thank you • Do what you said you were going to do • Offer them publicity • Keep them informed • Wait a while, then ask them again, but for something different or giving them a new angle. Further reading and resources Charities Aid Foundation have done some research on company investment in charities – see their website at http://www.cafonline.org An article on the most ethical companies in the FTSE 350 http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/ story/0,,2156206,00.html South Yorkshire Funding Advice Bureau The Workstation 15 Paternoster Row Sheffi eld S1 2BX Tel: 0114 249 4343 Email: enquiries@syfab.org.uk Website: www.syfab.org.uk We can provide this information in other formats on request. Please get in touch to discuss your needs. Our information is produced for local community and voluntary groups. No permission is needed for limited reproduction if SYFAB is acknowledged. Large scale reproduction or inclusion in publications for sale must have written permission from SYFAB. SYFAB welcomes your comments and criticism. You can talk to any member of staff, or contact us by post, phone, fax or email. Registered Charity No: 1061118 Reg. Company No: 3030641 © SYFAB 2003 All rights reserved. Version 1