This BLOG is intended to help conservation organizations and land trusts pursue excellence in all aspects of their conservation endeavors. I welcome your comments and feedback to these posts.
20 October 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation As a fundraiser, I can honestly say that the future has never seemed more uncertain than it is right now. In many ways, it feels like we are teetering on the edge of something truly horrible (great depression?,...
13 October 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Rally week has now come and gone. It was my 15th Rally, not that it’s important, but the 2020 version was certainly different from the other 14! Nearly 4,000 people registered. Holy cow! The workshop I led had nearly...
6 October 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Q: What wine should I pair with dystopian outlook? A: All of them. There’s still a full calendar quarter to go, and I can’t wait for 2021. The future is as uncertain as it has ever been. And I’m talking...
29 September 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation On vacation this week, so I’m reposting a piece I wrote several years ago that seems still relevant. See you next week! When I was raising money for The Nature Conservancy, a former board member approached us about gifting...
22 September 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Here’s a great idea that deserves another mention: Send $50 to five different organizations you admire. It will cost your land trust $250, and it will take about half an hour. But for that investment, you will see every piece of...
15 September 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation First of all this week, let’s all take a moment to consider the members of our land trust community who are suffering due to the fires in the west. I have received several heartbreaking emails and messages from...
8 September 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Readers, I’d like you to meet my new friend RGF. RGF stands for Realty Gift Fund, and they buy and sell real estate for nonprofits. RGF, I’d like you to meet Readers. These are some of my best friends...
1 September 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Numbers are just numbers. Five, 23, 478. Meaningless. We use numbers all the time, expecting them to convey importance. Four species, 42 acres, 55 years old, 300 members. But they don’t. Or at least they don’t convey any more importance than...
25 August 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation I think we make a mistake when we focus our attention, and that of our donors, on the purchase price. For what it’s worth, it’s probably based on a misguided sense that we need to show ourselves to be...
18 August 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation I’m working on refining a Fundraising Planning Seminar for land trusts in Colorado, and I created a Five-Step process. Actually, it’s a process that has five steps assuming you are already clear about the goals! (See also Start with...