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The Stissing Center

Capital Campaign and Year-End Fundraising for a Rural Arts Nonprofit

The Stissing Center raised $230,000 in year-end fundraising, a 95% increase over the previous year, while laying the groundwork for a $10 million capital campaign.

The Challenge

Located in the small, rural town of Pine Plains, New York, The Stissing Center includes two performing arts venues that partner with “artists, individuals, and organizations to create meaningful programs, events, and opportunities.” Its programming brings world-class music and theater performances to community members of all ages, along with opportunities to learn about the arts. The Stissing Center also supports local businesses by drawing visitors to the area.

The Stissing Center was preparing to launch a $10 million capital campaign to finish renovations of their historic brick building and fund long-term operational needs.

At the same time, they needed to increase annual fundraising to maintain day-to-day operations—all with extremely limited internal capacity.

Moreover, while most of their funding came from out-of-town visitors, The Stissing Center wanted to make sure local residents continued to feel connected to the organization and their work.

front of the brick building

Their challenges were framed by three questions we needed to address:

  • How do we prioritize which donors to contact first for our capital campaign, and how much should we ask for?
  • What materials should we present to early-phase prospects to launch the capital campaign?
  • How do we craft annual fundraising messaging that will inspire the community to support us now and prepare them for the launch of our capital campaign?

Our Solutions

We strengthened The Stissing Center’s year-end fundraising strategy while priming audiences for its upcoming capital campaign.

Year-End Fundraising Strategy

  • Focusing on the power of their rural community, we used audience segmentation to make sure our targeted messaging reached the right people. For both the year-end and the capital campaigns, we created a distinct segment of potential donors.

  • We built campaign messaging around a sense of community pride, with communications that highlighted The Stissing Center’s role in making Pine Plains a special place.

  • We informed local residents that the executive director would be reaching out to discuss the organization’s renovation plans.

Capital Campaign Support

  • We launched The Stissing Center’s capital campaign with messaging carefully crafted to show how the project would benefit both locals and tourists.

  • To support the campaign, we developed digital and print materials, plus a pitch deck for initial donor presentations.

  • We created a gift pyramid based on giving history and wealth screening data, then used a formula to develop bold but appropriate ask amounts for the three-year campaign.

The Results

  • The Stissing Center raised $230,000 during their year-end fundraising campaign, a 95% increase year over year.
  • These results were achieved while priming the organization for the successful launch of their capital campaign.

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Whether you’re planning for year-end or building your annual strategy, successful campaigns start with a plan that fits your goals and your capacity. We can help you build yours—and put it to work.

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