Society of the Little Flower
Emergency Appeal to Drive Revenue
Related Services
Industry
Religious
Project Overview
The Society of the Little Flower (SLF) is a community of believers with a devotion to St. Therese. An important part of this community is the National Shrine and Museum of St. Therese, which is served and supported by the Society of the Little Flower. The shrine is in Darien, IL and attracts people from around the world to attend Mass, view the largest collection of St. Therese relics and memorabilia, gather at the Carmelite Spiritual Center, enjoy the serene grounds, and visit the gift shop.
Like many organizations that rely on visitors, a cost-effective, urgent solution was needed to alleviate the loss in revenue from a decrease in visitation to the National Shrine and Museum of St. Therese.
For Society of the Little Flower and their agency partner, Edge Direct, the goals were:
- Increase revenue to replace lost visitor revenue since fewer people were making the trip to the Shrine due to the pandemic.
- Improve acquisition response to help improve file health.
- Lower the cost to acquire metrics to improve campaign efficiency.
The mission of the Society of the Little Flower is to promote devotion to St. Therese of the Child Jesus, the Carmelite Nun and Doctor of the Church. Through prayers and donations, friends of St. Therese enable Carmelites throughout the world to make a difference in people’s lives through Gospel ministries and the education of seminarians, fulfilling her mission to “make God known and loved to the ends of the earth” in the most concrete ways of charity and justice.
Our Solution
The primary goal of this campaign was to replace the visitor revenue. At the same time, we saw it as an opportunity to thank donors for their generous support. The resulting package was an appeal campaign with personal correspondence from Fr. Tom, instead of a premium, urging support during this challenging time. To further engage donors, we included a personalized card letting donors know they would be included in a Special Benefactor’s Mass upon receipt of their gift.
Results
This campaign was incredibly successful for SLF, allowing them to raise substantial net income from a low-cost, nonpremium appeal. More than 10,000 donors responded with an average gift that was 30% higher in comparison to other 2021 renewal campaigns.
For this project, Edge Direct received a MAXI award from the Direct Marketing Association of Washington (DMAW).
