All of us are eager for the recession to end. After five fairly difficult financial years, there is a lot of pent-up demand for change in churches and ministries. These changes can take many forms, but they all represent important God-inspired projects that many of us have lacked the courage or conviction to pursue.

This may be an excellent time for many churches and ministries to work toward building capacity. Building capacity means tooling up to do more of what you feel called to do by acquiring the needed resources. This can be facilitated by embarking on the strategic visioning process called Visioning and Values. Strategic leadership interviews are followed by focus groups and then culminate in a retreat where actual operational targets are discussed and agreed upon.

Bountiful Harvest Consulting is excited about the opportunity to work with several congregations to determine a roadmap for the future. With churches around us failing and merging, it seems that many congregations and ministry boards have been hoping these problems would just go away. It is indeed sad to see the major Protestant denominations charting their annual losses. Startlingly, there are churches that are succeeding in spite of the trends. They are not all mega churches – some are quite small but have retained or regained the vitality needed to attract young families.

Why not begin a new chapter today! Call Bountiful Harvest or retain a denominational resource person to lead you through this important self examination. What stage is your church in? Pioneer, Emerging, Established or Dying. For that matter, what stage is your whole denomination in? To find this out, call Bountiful Harvest Consulting!

John Young, President
Bountiful Harvest Consulting
513-706-8410

I heard a presentation the other day about building new church buildings. Sometimes it is practical to add an addition to the existing structure, but many times new construction is the logical answer. The speaker went on to point out that many church building committees make damaging assumptions in relation to the type of structure to be built. Even experienced contractors sometimes fail to take these observations into account. If they can’t see the issue, how can the rest of us hope to make the right decisions about how best to proceed in determining what type of building might be most affordable?

The church used as an example wanted to build a new building to tie to their existing structures. The committee believed that a metal structure would be the most economical and began to interview architects with that in mind. No one was too happy about it but they seemed resigned to the “big metal barn.” At a rather late point in the process, one of the architects being considered pointed out that building costs vary from market to market. After some investigation, the committee found that they could build a masonry structure for slightly less money than the metal building.

I thought it was interesting and I decided to pass this along to our clients and prospective clients. Check every type of building before making that important and costly decision. Happy Building!

John Young, President
Bountiful Harvest Consulting
513-706-8410

I read recently that a survey of 1000 churches across the USA who had recently conducted capital stewardship campaigns uncovered some real disparity in both style and results. The study was conducted by Volkart May & Associates, a Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota-based marketing and market research firm.

The study showed the following:

Average Campaign Results – self directed vs. professionally directed

1.7 x annual plate and pledge for a self-directed capital church campaign with a three-year pledge payout.

2.3 x annual plate and pledge for a professionally-directed campaign with a three-year pledge payout.

Now that we see the effectiveness of a professionally-directed campaign, let us differentiate between the levels of involvement by the fundraising firms.

The study showed the following:

Average Campaign Results – style of campaign

1.75 x annual plate and pledge for the Advice-Oriented Approach

3.01 x annual plate and pledge for the Assistance-Oriented Approach

The difference between these two approaches are found in the number of times that the consultant is on-site during the campaign. The Advice-Oriented Campaign could well be run out of a manual purchased on the internet, while the Assistance-Oriented Approach makes the consultant a working member of the campaign cabinet.

You may be asking yourself, “Just how and what does the Bountiful Harvest representative become a part of our church team? Let’s look at another conclusion from the study.

The study showed the following:

Average Campaign Results – style of request

1.92 x annual plate and pledge for a professionally-directed campaign with an “impersonal” style of request for gifts.

3.24 x annual plate and pledge for a professionally-directed campaign with a highly-structured, sophisticated series of in-person requests with campaign consultant involved in planning each visit.

The study concluded that professionally-administered campaigns with a direct, in-person style of contact yielded 90.5% larger results. At Bountiful Harvest, we call our campaign style the “resident” style. We prefer to spend much more time with our clients so that we can really understand the culture of your church. We enjoy worshipping with our client churches before and during the campaign and even had a Bountiful Harvest Team Member fill in as a guest preacher with a client church.

The study showed a wide variety of results among our competitors, but we are very pleased to be out-performing our two largest competitors by substantial margin. Several other smaller competitors routinely promise more to get the work and then often deliver less than projected.

John Young
President
Bountiful Harvest Consulting
513-706-8410

As world events, family affairs and holiday preparations swirl around us, we at Bountiful Harvest pause to joyfully anticipate the celebration of the birth of our Savior.

At this season of Advent, we thank our staff, clients, friends and partner organizations for the opportunity to serve them. We wish you the very best of blessings for the approaching year.

Sincerely,
John Young
Bountiful Harvest Consulting

Last Fall, facing a cold winter ahead without heat, the historic First Lutheran Church in Over-the-Rhine, Cincinnati, was seriously in danger of having to close many of its valuable services to the community.

Bountiful Harvest knew that helping raise capital funds for First Lutheran would be a unique challenge. Working with a committee of people from First Lutheran and other area Lutheran churches, a strategic plan was set in place and the campaign was begun.

Taking the capital campaign far beyond the church's sphere and into other area churches and communities, success was celebrated when the church was able to install a heating system as well as air conditioning. Happily, worship and Sunday school as well as community services continued, including the Drop Inn Shelter and Community Lunches.

Bountiful Harvest president John Young presented a commemorative plaque in July to First Lutheran's Pastor Fred Cook celebrating the church's dedication to serving the Over-the-Rhine community.

Paula Goodnight
Vice President of Communications/Consultant
Bountiful Harvest Consulting
Paula@BountifulHC.com
513-884-8171