This article provides policy guidance to environmental nonprofit organizations, and, secondarily, to other nonprofits, that are considering entering into a cause-related marketing (CRM) alliance. Toward that end, insights into establishing CRM committees, sponsorship development, and regulatory awareness are offered to environmental nonprofit managers.
The author argues that strong consumer support for Zocal environmental concerns translates into strategic fundraising opportunities for regional, state, and local environmental organizations that have underutilized CRM in the past.
OR cause-oriented, nonprofit organizations, fundraising campaigns have traditionally focused on some formula of di-F rect-mail solicitation, fundraising events, and competitive grantsmanship. Beginning in the 1980s, a fundraising phenomenon emerged to expand the traditional components of this revenue formula: cause-related marketing (CRM).
CRM began with the American Express Company's first experiment to help fund the 1981 San Francisco Arts Festival. During a three-month period, American Express donated two cents to the festival every time customers used their American Express credit cards. The final total contributed to the festival from this "affinity group" marketing arrangement was $100,000 ("AmEx Shows the Way. . . ," 1982). American Express went national in its 1983 campaign to assist in the restoration of the Statue of Liberty The success of this CRM campaign for both the Statue of Liberty and the American Express Company (which has copyrighted the term cause-related marketing) was impressive: Card usage increased 28 percent over the year earlier, the number of new cards issued rose 45 percent, and the Statue 403