The fragrant memorial sprays at the front of the room combine elegant, pale yellow roses and lilies with striking pink gladiolus. The women wear black dresses, with hats and their best pearls. The men are in dark suits.
As the swells of organ music fade, a man at the podium announces the theme of the service in a booming preacher’s voice — “In Memoriam of the Estate Tax.”
The occasion is the kickoff of the Goodman Theatre’s annual estate-planning seminar, led by Robert Hamilton, one of Chicago’s leading lawyers. The nonprofit takes a dramatic approach to its planned-giving events, tying the theme to one of its current performances.
“The Little Foxes,” a play that turns on a dying man’s threat to change his will, led to this year’s theme, “Outfoxing Uncle Sam: How to Plan Your Estate.” Past gems have included “The Tax Man Cometh” and “Brigadoon: Almost Like Being In Love — the Joy of a Well-Planned Estate.”
Planned giving can be a difficult subject to broach because of its association with death, says Dorlisa Martin, Goodman’s director of development. The humor and theatricality of the seminars can help break the ice.
“That’s the wonderful thing about theater,” she says. “When you see something portrayed, sometimes it’s easier to have those conversations and talk about it.”
Goodman’s Spotlight Society, which honors donors who have made planned gifts, has 125 members. Each year, it adds five to 10 new donors.
Shopping Gifts Around
As America grows older, more charities are trying to start those discussions with donors about estate gifts. Large organizations with a long history of planned giving are hiring more gift officers, while smaller nonprofits are setting up fledgling programs. Nonprofits are targeting baby boomers who are at the prime age to start thinking about legacy gifts, but fundraisers are learning that they take more wooing than previous generations.
“It’s much more competitive than it used to be,” says John Osterlund, chief development officer at Rotary International.
In the past five years, Rotary has doubled the number of planned-gift officers on its staff to six — making the most of what could be considered a liability, an aging donor base.
They find fierce competition for older people’s support. Donors who want to set up an annuity or a trust — giving an asset, such as real estate or appreciated stocks, in exchange for regular payments during their lifetime — will contact Rotary to find out the terms it can offer.
But many times, they’re shopping their gifts around. They’re having the same conversation with their church, their alma mater, and other charities — something Mr. Osterlund says he didn’t see earlier in his career.
A Hedge Against Hard Times
The growing number of older donors isn’t the only factor driving the increase in efforts to win estate gifts.
The recession demonstrated how important deferred gifts could be as a hedge against difficult economic conditions, says Phyllis Freedman, a planned-giving consultant in Washington. Revenue from estate gifts remained steady at a time when other types of fundraising faltered.
“Planned gifts come when someone dies; that’s going to happen whether the stock market is roaring or retreating,” Ms. Freedman says.
The trick will be making sure the lesson sticks.
In nonprofits, there’s always a tension between doing things that will bring in money now versus sometime in the future, says Ms. Freedman. What made planned giving so valuable during the recession — the fact that it was deferred — makes it a harder sell during good times, especially for charities that are starting a program from scratch.
“Everybody needs to be absolutely clear that it’s not going to have a return on investment in the first year, the second year, maybe not for five or seven or 10 years,” says Ms. Freedman.
The decision to seek estate gifts isn’t always easy. Like many antipoverty groups, the Greater Chicago Food Depository is new to planned giving. It began sending materials to donors about 18 months ago. A big reason for the slow start is philosophical, says Kate Maehr, the group’s chief executive.
“Frankly, there was a reluctance to the idea of endowing hunger,” she says.
The food depository was founded in 1979 by a group of community leaders who believed it would end hunger in Chicago by 2000, says Ms. Maehr. Seeking gifts that might not come in for a decade or more was tantamount to saying hunger would always be around. It felt like admitting defeat.
The World War II generation is nearly gone, and the Silent Generation that followed is small. So baby boomers are now the primary target of charities’ appeals. To be successful, fundraisers will have to adapt their approaches to a different style of giving.
It wasn’t unusual for members of the World War II generation who left money to charity in their wills to split it among seven or eight organizations, says Ms. Freedman. She thinks that number is likely to shrink, in part because baby boomers are more hands-on when they support causes.
“Baby boomers do a lot more tire-kicking,” says Rebecca Rothey, a director of gift planning at Johns Hopkins University and Medicine. “They believe they know how to solve the problems. They don’t trust large institutions to be able to solve them.”
It’s also the first generation that has had large numbers of women working outside the home and building their own wealth.
“Traditionally, we always defaulted to the idea that the husband was the donor,” says Ms. Rothey. “Now you really have to be careful because it can be the wife, and philanthropy is done separately as often as it is done as a couple.”
Simple Reminders
Planned giving can be intimidating. The most sophisticated gifts are complicated and have to be drawn up by lawyers. But it can also be as simple as reminding donors that bequests are an option.
New Hope Ministries, in Dillsburg, Pa., includes a reply envelope with its thank-you letters. Instead of having a reminder to place a stamp in the upper right-hand corner, there’s a box that reads, “Have you remembered New Hope in your will?” The organization has a planned-giving page on its website, and staff members include a reminder about estate gifts in their email signatures.
New Hope’s planned-giving program is still small. The charity knows about 16 people who have made estate gifts, and it hopes to add another four this year.
Older donors are starting to think about their legacies, says Molly Helmstetter, New Hope’s director of development.
“Be prepared,” she says, “and get the message out now.”
