EP 99: Elevating Fundraising Events with FCA South Denver

Positioning review: Minor adjustments made. Reframed several prescriptive fundraising statements to experiential framing (e.g., "you've got to" changed to "we found that" or similar observational language). Product mentions of Handbid kept factual and in context of the guest's firsthand experience. All other content is naturally conversational, reflecting the guest's direct experience with FCA South Denver event fundraising.

Jeff: Welcome to Elevate Your Event, your favorite podcast for transforming fundraising events. Join us weekly for expert tips and creative ideas to make your next event a standout success. Welcome to Elevate Your Event, the podcast that's all about taking your fundraising events to the next level. Today, we're talking with David Farmer from FCA South Denver about how they turned golf tournaments and steak dinners into powerful, donor-driven experiences. From small wins to big risks, this one's packed with lessons you don't want to miss. Let's dive in.

Jeff: All right, well, welcome back to the Elevate Your Event Podcast. We talk about all the various ways you can make your next fundraising event better. And we've got a special guest in studio. We don't get a lot of in-person guests, but we were able to talk this guy into coming in and visiting us. Well, please welcome David Farmer. He is the area director for FCA South Denver.

David: Thanks for letting me jump on here.

Jeff: David, you're one of my favorite people in the world. That's good enough. So thank you for coming in. We are here to talk about events. So tell us a little bit about FCA for those folks who aren't necessarily familiar. Some people have probably heard of it, but what you guys do at FCA and then in the South Denver area -- what your mission field looks like and what your struggles are, especially because we're going to get into fundraising and events here in a second.

David: That's a hot topic for sure. So FCA has been around since 1954, and the cool part about FCA is that it started actually right here in Colorado at Estes Park.

Jeff: I did not know that.

David: Yeah, so a guy by the name of Don McClennon saw how professional athletes were being used to leverage products. And he thought, well, can they be leveraged for the gospel? And so he rallied them all here at Estes Park. They did a camp, which is kind of an event. And these athletes got fired up from a guy named Billy Graham, who a lot of people in the faith community know. And then they all got fired up and went back into their homes and places where they play sports and started sharing the gospel. And then they created these what they call huddles -- on campus or off campus Bible studies. And that's kind of how FCA got started. So now, 2024, we're a global ministry in 115 countries around the world. We're in every state in the United States, even Utah, which is kind of crazy to think. And then we're right here locally in South Denver.

Jeff: That's great.

David: So in the South Denver area, we have campus huddles -- these Bible studies -- in about 45 different schools. We work with nearly 2,500 coaches and athletes on a weekly basis. And we run probably six to eight events a year.

Jeff: So let's talk about the need and then obviously how we fulfill the need. So the need here -- you've got 2,500 students and athletes and coaches that you're working with on a weekly basis. But what percentage of the total is that really? It's got to be a low percentage, I would think.

David: We have a goal to reach what we call critical mass, and we want to reach 10% of every high school. So in a given high school here in South Denver, probably three to four thousand kids. And 75% of those kids probably play some sort of sports. So if you can get 1,000 to 1,500 kids involved in FCA on campus, you're hitting critical mass, which then changes the game. You create influence.

Jeff: So how many high schools are in Arapahoe County?

David: Just in Arapahoe County? 24.

Jeff: 24. So your goal is to get to 24,000 kids.

David: Yes. And we're at 2,500.

Jeff: You've got a long way to go.

David: We do. But that's what excites us because we never have to worry about the need. We never have to worry about reaching kids because the need is so great.

Jeff: So the way to do that is you've got to go out there and raise money. Because obviously, if you're going to be trying to reach 10 times what you're currently reaching, you're going to need more people on campus -- more area reps, right?

David: We call them area reps, yeah. So these reps need to be at these schools. And to do that, you need to fund them. So we need to go out and raise some money. That is always the hot topic within the organization -- how do you raise money? I'll be a little frank. One of the challenges that we face is that our organization doesn't have a development team. What they do is they empower local staff to be fundraisers and develop their own personal support. And there's a lot of challenges with that. But my job is sort of to be the chief fundraiser for a staff of a dozen to reach all these 2,500 kids.

Jeff: And so that development degree and fundraising degree you got in college is helping, right?

David: It sure is. It sure is.

Jeff: So full disclosure, I sit on your advisory board, so I understand some of these things. But let's dive into this a little bit. You've got a number of area reps, and you're obviously trying to increase that number, and these people are out there raising their own support -- basically fundraising for their own salary.

David: They are.

Jeff: And so that's one area where you're collecting income. There's some pros and cons to that entire model. This is an Elevate Your Event Podcast, not a proper way to fundraise podcast. So that one's probably left for another day. It's got its pros and cons. Obviously, there's some skin in the game, but there's also a lack of a real connection between FCA and some of these donors because the connection resides with the area rep. So then another area would be the general community.

David: Yeah. And to reach them, you do events.

Jeff: So let's talk about how those evolved over the years. You've been in and around FCA for a long time -- like 14 years or something like that.

David: Here's a crazy story. So I was in graduate school, and upon completion I had to do an internship. And that's how I discovered FCA. And I had to do what we call a God and Breakfast event. So the U.S. Senior Open was at the Broadmoor, and we brought in a guy by the name of David Cook, who's a renowned author.

Jeff: I know him.

David: He wrote Seven Days of Utopia and did a movie. He was a professional golfer's mental coach. So I brought him in and we had about four or five U.S. Senior Open players come and share their testimony, like a Q&A, kind of like a conversation with champions. And we did this down in Colorado Springs and it was such a hit. FCA was like, hey, how would you like to come on staff? And I thought it was going to be to minister to athletes and coaches, but I think they hired me to do events. So that was like my first event ever. And from then, being on staff cumulatively over 14 years, we've done dinners and golf events and luncheons and marathon runs and all kinds of different things.

Jeff: We call them the -athons.

David: So there's a lot of those -athons. And we can get into that because I think you guys do a -- you've changed it a little bit -- but it was a hundred holes of golf, which to me is a marathon of golf, if not more.

Jeff: It is a marathon for sure. So outside of that, we're trying to supplement the income coming in from area reps because obviously we need to give them a little bit of runway to get up to support, but also be able to cover them when they have a bad month. So we're going to go out there and raise money through other means. And this isn't a show about grants, but grants is another avenue. For this one with events, we're going to go out there and have these events and try to attract or invite the general community. So let's go back. You come back into the FCA world in 2017.

David: I did, yeah.

Jeff: And what events were they running back then?

David: So they were running a few golf tournaments. There was a dinner, something called the Bill McCartney dinner they had just kind of launched. And I think they were doing this 100-hole golf marathon. But other than that, that was really it.

Jeff: For all of Denver?

David: Yeah. And so when I came on board, I was kind of asking the questions -- what are we doing to expose potential donors other than these couple of events? And are we attracting the right people? And there was no consistency. There was no real strategic plan on how to leverage events to attract people to the ministry that we can then engage them to expand beyond.

Jeff: So it's almost like peer-to-peer fundraising, right? I'm going to go out and attract my friends and family to support me. That's one area. But how do we get the general public, the business community, to get connected to what FCA is doing outside of supporting an area rep?

David: And so you walk in the door and you're like, okay, so I have a couple of golf tournaments, I've got a Bill McCartney dinner. What are we doing to attract people to those? What kind of relationship can I start at those? Because golf tournaments -- let's be honest, everybody likes golf tournaments. Some people do. The problem with golf tournaments is it's really hard to connect with people at golf tournaments.

Jeff: It's almost impossible. Because even if you host and you're seeing every foursome come through, it's like, hey, how's it going, great, so glad you're here, and then they're off. If you play, you're only connecting with three or four guys.

David: Right. And a golf tournament, you realize you're going to make a small amount of money on your return. And you have to think of it as just a small way of connecting with people. And then you hope that you can build off of that.

Jeff: You've got to put your staff at a par three where it's backed up and then talk. Because you're right, what else do you do? So you've got these golf tournaments. People are doing that. 100 holes of golf is just a peer-to-peer fundraiser.

David: Totally is. But the margin on that is amazing if you can get the course for free or at a discounted price. So that's a great fundraiser on a profit side of it. But again, the whole idea of an event is to cultivate the relationship to where a donor would then say, hey, I want to invest into this ministry beyond just coming to a typical golf tournament or even a dinner.

Jeff: So outside of that, you end up doing -- and I was not on your advisory board at the time -- but you start doing a gala dinner night, right? That was at the barn, I believe.

David: Yeah, we did a couple tournaments before I think you had jumped on. But I think you had brought in the idea of doing the two-day event where we did a dinner and then a golf tournament the next day.

Jeff: We couldn't get you guys to let go of the golf tournament.

David: We may be letting it go soon here. It's just fun. Golf tournaments are fun for the golfers. But I think the challenge there was what we just discussed -- how am I going to build a connection with everybody? And not only that, there's hundreds of golf tournaments now. I think that's such a typical fundraiser for a lot of nonprofits -- to do a golf tournament because it's easy -- versus something that could be way more profitable and attract even a different type of donor. I think of an event where you could go clay shooting or pigeon shooting. Could you create a donor experience where there's an overnight component to it? I have this vision to do an event where we call it the Best Day Ever where you play nine holes or 18 holes, you go shooting, and you drive a race car. So you create this experience.

Jeff: Sounds like a dude's day. My wife would consider the best day ever to be somewhere in a spa with a haircut. But again, that's another way. So we're doing these events. And I think even prior to you coming back around, FCA had done some galas in the past that I thought, even as an attendee, were fairly successful.

David: Yeah, raising a decent amount of money, having three or four or five hundred people in the room. It's not bad.

Jeff: And those kind of fell by the wayside. You come back in and then we're looking at these golf tournaments and saying we're just not growing a donor base from this. And so what we've talked about is -- as a fundraiser, I want to see that list grow. I want my Constant Contact database getting bigger. And so to do that, coming from some experience and other events that we've done with Handbid, I said, look, this seems to be the trend. We're going to do a gala on Sunday night and a golf tournament on Monday morning because you're going to get the best of both worlds. You're going to connect with everybody Sunday night. And then the golfers are going to go play golf on Monday. You don't have the stress of trying to do an auction at your golf tournament. You can do all that on Sunday night. And you have the opportunity to sit there in front of them at the gala and talk about what the organization is doing.

David: Yeah. It's kind of like a dual threat. You're hitting both groups. And I've always heard that wives usually are the ones that influence the discretionary income decisions. So if you get them and captivate them with the stories, usually they're the ones that say, let's give, let's invest. And then the guys go play golf and do their thing and have fun. Not to say that there aren't women that play golf.

Jeff: Right. But to your point, a lot of times spouses aren't going out on a golf outing together. But spouses do want to make family-level decisions about how they want to support an organization. And so it's pretty rare that some guy's going to show up or some lady's going to show up at the golf tournament, get moved by some 10-minute talk, and donate five grand and go home and tell their spouse.

David: If somebody figures out that secret sauce, let me know. I've never seen it.

Jeff: Because I think a lot of times these families want to make those decisions together. So when they're sitting at a table together, they can do that. So you don't want to lose the golf tournament. You want to keep that fun element to it. We had the gala the night before. And we did our first one -- and this was not the first time the Osbournes had hosted this event for FCA, but we decided to do it down at the barn, and then we had the golf tournament the next day. Tell us, how was that first one?

David: It was a learning curve for sure. I had never personally done anything like that. So there was a learning curve, a lot of elements of the event to put together. But at the end, it was awesome because we did get to connect with donors. We did get to share a story. We got to try to touch into that emotional side of people to ask them to invest. I think we raised 60, 70 grand, which was pretty good.

Jeff: For your first event.

David: Yeah, for our first event. We really didn't have a baseline of what we could do. And so we were very pleased. There were things that -- mistakes that we made and things that we could definitely learn from. But overall, hitting that sort of goal was pretty cool. And the venue was awesome.

Jeff: So let's talk about the organization and the prep of your first event. Because let's be honest, we have a lot of people listening to this podcast, and they're thinking the same thing -- my staff is very good at what they do, but they're not event planners, and they're definitely not auction managers and software users. So you're rolling into this very first event -- what are you leaning on? And who's helping you guys figure this out?

David: Well, we leaned on you a little bit. When we agreed to do the event at the barn, we agreed with -- I think they had an event planner, not only the Osbournes, but Pam. And the nice thing about her, she created a timeline -- these are things that you need to get done, these are things that you need to accomplish. And we sort of leaned on each other as directors that were part of the event, because we realized very quickly, like you said, that our area reps are fantastic when it comes to being in the schools and ministering to the coaches and athletes. But they don't have capacity or time to go get donation items. And we learned that very quickly. When we did put that pressure on them, we didn't get the results that we wanted. So we had to learn very quickly that it's better to have volunteers who specifically go do that. And we found a couple of people that just loved going to every McDonald's, yogurt shop, wherever they could find something free. That was the saving grace -- we found a couple of people that just love to do that. And then we leveraged the relationships we had and asked some donors and our board to get some larger items that could be bid on. But we had to lean on each other first because this was all trial by error. We're spreading our wings here learning how this works because we'd never done anything like this before. It was brand new.

Jeff: And so let's talk about the good, the bad, and the ugly of your first event because we were talking about how we elevated it. That first one -- it was good, it was decent, right? There were some parts about it that were not great. I'm not picking on the staff at all, but there were some mistakes the auctioneer made. And as everything happens at events, they don't go on time.

David: I think we were there until like 10:30.

Jeff: In terms of the donor experience, do you feel like you created a good donor experience at that event?

David: Yeah, I think overall people were having a good time. And I think that's largely because of the venue. You walk into this venue and here's all these cool classic cars and everybody's dressed up in a Western theme. We even had a guy come dressed up with a holster. So I think the theme, the venue really created the experience to have a good time. The food was good.

Jeff: I'd agree with all that. I don't think anybody really noticed the hiccups. And it's all about lessons learned, right? We knew -- the people in the know who knew the run of show knew what was being messed up a little bit. Nothing tragic. I just want to point that out to anybody listening to the show. Everything is overcomable and it's kind of like "never let them see you sweat." It's the first event. We're going to make some mistakes. Everybody involved is going to make a mistake here or there. The overall experience was good. I think the guests had a fantastic time.

David: I would agree. It did run late. And so we had some grumpy board members who wanted to go to bed earlier than that. It was also, unfortunately, on the night of a Broncos game.

Jeff: You remember that? I still give a board member grief that he didn't come because the Broncos were more important than supporting the charity he's part of. I 100% agree with you. These are the things we ran into. My derby event that just happened was on the night of the Nuggets and the Avalanche. And this guy comes up and he's like, are you going to show the Nuggets game and the Avalanche game on the big screen? I'm like, no, I'm going to show the horse race. And then we're going to have this country music concert with an artist we brought in from Nashville. And he's looking at me like, really? I'm like, yes. Can you not miss a game? It's fine. This isn't the end of the world.

David: And I think when you're doing events, it's important to figure out is there a Broncos game, is there a Nuggets game, is there anything going on.

Jeff: We knew. There's always going to be something. It just so happened that they moved the game to Sunday night.

David: Gotcha. So they flexed it.

Jeff: Yes. We knew the Broncos were playing the 49ers, and then they announced it was going to be the Sunday night game that week. Perfect. That's exactly what we wanted. So anyway, there were some little hiccups here and there. And then you had some board members that I think were overly critical of how it went, because I think one of the things we collectively did not do a good job of is setting expectations on what is reasonable for a gala that you've run for the first time in probably five or six years.

David: Yeah.

Jeff: And not really over those five or six years from when you ran your last gala -- let's be brutally honest -- FCA had done nothing to nurture these donors. So we're starting over with that. We deliver this event. It's for the most part good. It has some hiccups. It raises $60,000. I call that a win.

David: I would too.

Jeff: Now, are we satisfied with that? Because 60 grand -- think about it. We're trying to go from 2,500 kids to 25,000 kids. That's a lot. We're going to need a lot more money than 60 grand. And we know -- we've run the numbers -- we're going to need $6 million, not $60,000.

David: That's right. We will.

Jeff: So we regroup. The golf tournament was fine. We did the golf tournament the next day. Some guy falling off a golf cart -- that was bad. But things happen.

David: That's the fun part of events. You just never know what's going to happen sometimes.

Jeff: So then we decide, okay, how do we elevate this? What did we discuss at that point?

David: I think we regrouped and started asking the questions -- were our auction items good? Did we do a good ask? Did we really touch into the emotional part of a donor? Did the people that we wanted to be there -- were they inviting high-capacity people? We asked those types of questions. We talked through some logistical stuff -- registration, price points, different things like that. So those are all things that we thought we could elevate to attract different people and raise more money.

Jeff: So what we decided to do at that point is -- we were fairly confident the barn would not be available again, and it was a barn, so it kind of creates this cowboy, country theme. And we're thinking, if we want to elevate this, we want to go a little bit more high end. We decided to do what?

David: We went to Fleming's Steakhouse. We rented out the entire Fleming's Steakhouse, which I have seen charities do before in Denver. And we also moved the golf course to a higher-end course -- Cherry Creek Country Club.

Jeff: So we upgrade the golf course. And then we upgrade the venue to Fleming's with the intention of -- this is going to be more expensive. We're going to have to raise our table prices. It can't be an $800 table anymore.

David: And I was nervous. Are we really going to do this? This is scary. There's a lot of money that we're putting into this to elevate our game. And I was like, I hope this works.

Jeff: But let's talk about that. You're bringing up a good point -- we took some risks. And I do this even at my own event. I'll say, we're going to take this risk, and the worst case is we're going to break even. We're not going to lose money. A lot of organizations say, I don't want to make that change because then I'm going to lose money. It's probably rare that you're going to lose money unless it completely flops. But the cost of a person at Fleming's is a couple hundred bucks. I can't sell a $250 ticket and have it cost $150 or $160 a person. Think about golf tournaments -- very similar. You turn your gala into a golf tournament and the margins aren't there unless you raise these prices up. So now we need a minimum of three or four hundred a person as our goal.

David: And so we elevated our sponsorship packages and what we can offer people. And that was really helpful. And there was a lot of discussion with our board, which I think gives you confidence -- okay, we can actually do this. Because there's wisdom in that when everybody who's been around events, including you, is like, hey, let's elevate this. I think that gives confidence to the director. Okay, we can sell. We're at least going to break even. And then if we raise anything above that, that's awesome.

Jeff: Think about what we talked about in that board meeting. We're chatting about needing to elevate these sponsorship packages. And there's people in that room saying, that's too expensive for me. Well, it's not necessarily about you, but I get that you're going to have to find some other supporters. But what we talked about is it's really hard to get somebody to give you a $10,000 sponsorship when that's your highest level. But when there's a level at 15 or 20 or 25, $10,000 looks like the middle of the pack -- they're going to give it.

David: That's true. I think there's almost a perception -- if you're only putting $10,000 out there, then what's the perception of the nonprofit? Versus if you have it tiered at 30, 20, 10 -- automatically you're starting to attract businesses or people. And then that $10,000 doesn't seem so daunting, especially if two or three people say, yeah, I'll jump in.

Jeff: Well, that's more money than you had last year. By changing just that little portion. We did that at my derby event -- we had these fire pit tables that seat six people. In the beginning, we're like, okay, let's make them $2,400. And we have 22 of them. People are like, that's so expensive. You know what made us sell more of them? When I added $5,000 tables.

David: Oh my gosh.

Jeff: Because as soon as I added $5,000 tables, the $2,400 table looks cheap. And all of a sudden we're selling them out. Oh, I can't do the five thousand, I really want to support the event, so I'm going to do the $2,500.

David: Right. Which was your goal originally.

Jeff: Exactly right. And so we elevate it. We elevate the food. We elevate the experience. Fleming's is awesome. In South Denver, Fleming's is a fantastic steakhouse. I would put them up against any of those places.

David: I didn't even eat that night. I ate at home and it still was fresh and tender and delicious.

Jeff: It's like your own wedding, David. You don't get to eat.

David: No. But that's how good it was. People still talk about it -- oh, I had a lobster tail and steak that night. When is it again? We heard things about the barn, but not like that.

Jeff: The barn food is good, but it's barbecue type food. It's very different. And what's your other option -- a hotel? What are you going to get in a hotel? Not nearly as good.

David: Some people were saying, I don't know, Jeff, this is really expensive. But it's going to work. And it did. Sometimes when you're doing an event, you have to step out in faith and believe. And I think that's where you came in and several of our board members -- you all had faith and everybody got excited because we knew we weren't going to lose money.

Jeff: Right. And that's why I think it's so cool. FCA puts a lot of pressure on staff to plan these events, but what they don't teach is build people around you to help you have that confidence or have that business perspective for someone like me to say, you're not going to lose money. Trust me. You're going to sell this out and you're at least going to break even.

David: Because you get business, and so do many of those other board members. And that gives confidence to a guy who's 70% focused on ministry development versus an event. So if you're going to elevate your game, have people that are business-minded that have done this to tell you, hey, you're going to be fine. The worst case is you break even, but then what if somebody comes up and says, I had such a great experience, I want to write you a $10,000 check. Was breaking even on the event worth it? Sure was.

Jeff: I agree. And it's also because we want to attract certain types of people to come to those events. And look, you've been in this for a long time. Rich people aren't necessarily generous. Generous people are generous. It's not that you just need to invite a bunch of rich people. But you want to create an intimate, fun atmosphere. I don't love hotel galas. I love this model. Fleming's is a very intimate room.

David: It is. And you can have a really good conversation with people. And it's an entry point. The whole point -- we see this all the time on Elevate Your Event -- it's not about, hey, buy a steak dinner, give them a speech, and then see them next year.

Jeff: So let's talk about how we continue to evolve. We also introduce another type of event throughout the year. It's been hit or miss, but the principles remain. Talk about Conversations with Champions.

David: I actually really love Conversations with Champions because it does create that intimate feeling of potential donors seeing and feeling and touching the ministry. I think that idea came from you actually. And so we've been able to put that together. A Conversation with Champions is a person out in the marketplace or a former athlete that we would consider a champion -- a champion on and off the field -- to share their testimony. And it's a Q&A format, so it's not someone that gets up and gives a speech. They're interviewed in a way that really pulls out their story of how they live out their faith. So we've had college quarterbacks, professional coaches, NBA commentators. We had a general come who is now in charge of the playoffs -- he was the former commandant of the Air Force Academy and then became the head of the selection committee for the college playoffs.

Jeff: He got bombarded. I don't think he's coming back.

David: I don't think so either. Not after who they picked.

Jeff: And we had an NFL referee who was previously involved in FCA in Colorado. What a fascinating conversation. And we had Clint Hurdle from the Rockies. The point of these is not just for the business community to come in and hear faith stories, but also hear kind of a little bit of insider stuff. I remember when this was a resurrected event. FCA did a few of them in the past, and I helped FCA get Clint Hurdle to come in literally two weeks after he was fired back in like 2008. And the room was packed.

David: Do they want to hear about Clint Hurdle's faith? They really did. But they really wanted to hear about why he got fired, I'm sure.

Jeff: But that's good. Because you've got people coming in the door that want some NFL insider stories. They want to hear from this NFL ref. They want to ask questions about the chip in the ball and new first-down technology and what rule changes are happening. Does the NFL favor the Chiefs? That came up. He wouldn't answer it. But those types of things -- you intermingle the faith element and also what the needs are. And you're building a relationship with the business community. What's our goal with Conversations with Champions?

David: I think they're micro events. Events to give people a sample size of what the ministry is, to then potentially invite them to the next event.

Jeff: Steak and T's.

David: Steak and T's. I want them to buy a table there. And to get them to buy a table, I might have to see them three or four times at a Conversation with Champions before they'll make a decision. And then just call them and be like, man, you've come to three of these. This is awesome. We want you to go deeper with us. How about you buy a table at Steak and T's?

Jeff: I think that's all about evaluating your events. You have strategic micro events to invite people to your big events, where you can intimately connect with them and begin that generosity. So let's talk about the mechanical side. When we talk about these intermediate events, we're saying, okay, we're going to do these Conversations with Champions, we're going to build this donor relationship. You've got to do certain things at these events in order to accomplish that.

David: Yes. Capturing donor information.

Jeff: David and I've had this chat before. Because what we've talked about is the micro events are there to educate and entertain the business community. These are lunches for the most part, right? A free lunch for somebody -- the tickets are not expensive. The whole point is to break even. But it's to get 50, 75, 100, 150, maybe 200 people eventually coming to these. They come out maybe once a month or every six or eight weeks. And then capture their info and start to market -- thanks for coming, here's the next one, here's our newsletter, and here's our big gala coming up that we really want you to participate in. And we're not trying to turn Steak and T's into a 2,000-person event. I'd rather have 200 people in that room spending more money than 2,000 spending less. We've got to really be able to connect with these people.

David: I've been to events where there's a thousand people in the ballroom and the speaker's on the stage, but there's not that connection of intimacy. You're not necessarily being pulled emotionally to want to be seriously involved financially. But with Steak and T's, we can really do that. We brought in a couple coaches, a couple students, and this one student delivered a message that was just like, holy smokes. The ministry has really helped her and her growth. And people got around that. They can really see the tangible effect of what their investment is going into. I think that's the whole idea -- creating more intimate environments allows you to do storytelling. And storytelling is powerful.

Jeff: We've talked about that on this podcast. But going back to the functionality -- the most important thing when we do these events is to capture the contact info of these donors. And Handbid does a great job with that. FCA has a challenging CRM.

David: It is, because it's a system that can be universally given out to 2,500 staff across the country and globally. But there's so many things that it lacks when you're trying to build a donor base or run events. If you're going to run an event, get around the people that this is what they do and they have the best products. I've been really blessed with that.

Jeff: I appreciate that. But I would also say it's on us to capture that information.

David: Yes. It's on us. Until these tools are fully AI and you're basically logging in and saying, run my event -- you have some work to do.

Jeff: We do. And that's talking about the good, bad, and ugly. That's the part where as a staff we have to get better -- as we capture information of people, you can then begin those relationships, begin those phone calls. But if you don't do the first step -- it's like going up to bat. If you don't step in the batter's box, you're not going to hit anything. So step up and let's go.

David: Yeah. That's the part where we're getting better, but we could be a lot better.

Jeff: But that's the point. It's always a work in progress. We are all works in progress. I was working with a client the other day -- client slash friend -- and he was watching me on a screen share help him get some stuff going. And we loaded 270 items, resized images, and loaded 270 images in about 15 minutes.

David: Wow. So it is doable.

Jeff: Right. And he's like, can you record this because I just need to go back and watch it. And he's been using the software for a while. So it's one of those things where it's always something we progress on. And we always -- not to be critical -- we come back after an event, celebrate, and then turn around and say, how do we make it better?

David: Yes. I think if you're going to elevate your events, you have to do some sort of analysis -- whether it's a SWOT analysis or a good, bad, ugly -- whatever way you want to do it. You've got to go back and look at what you did right, what you got wrong. And even ask from an outside perspective, even people from the audience. As a matter of fact, there was a lady who attended our event and she was really excited about it. So we actually hired her to be our event planner. And we asked, how would you change some things? And there were a lot of things that she said she would change. But now we're hoping going into this year our event will be even better.

Jeff: I'm confident it will. And if you look at where you've come as an organization from the very first event where the auctioneer missed the entire paddle raise speech you were supposed to give -- he just skipped right over David. All of those little things, to elevating the venue, elevating the prices -- and we're going to continue to elevate different elements. I think you're on the right track.

David: I appreciate that. Not only is it growth in our event, but even growth for me. I remember a guy telling me -- I was like, man, this is really hard to justify asking someone to pay $300 for a foursome at Cherry Creek. And he goes, you're a first-class ministry and you need to act like it. You need to be at first-class facilities and not be ashamed of that at all. And I was like, 100%. Let's go.

Jeff: We have that conversation all the time. It's okay to elevate even certain things that you just view as a cost. Because it creates a certain ambiance or look that you want. We do that with our brand and our website and our derby event because if I'm going to be Denver's classiest derby event, it has to look classy. And that goes down to the wine we serve. People are like, can you cut costs here or there? No. That's not what we do here. We're not going to spend thrift. We don't serve Camus. But at the same time, we're not serving Yellow Tail wine. No offense to Yellow Tail people. We're not serving jug wine either. What we say is, if you want to make more money at your event, elevate -- get people to spend more. Everybody starts with, how do I spend less? And I'm like, let's talk about how we get people to spend more.

David: I think as a director of any nonprofit, you have to overcome that and learn, hey, we're going to have to spend some money on these things. Instead of shortcutting stuff, if you really believe in what you do, then don't sell yourself short. Go for it. And it goes for your software, too. It's the staff that come. It's the software you use. Don't just say, this one's free. If they're hitting up your donors for their money, these software platforms cost money. Somebody's paying for it.

Jeff: It's the same thing. When I look at my event and Steak and T's, we had this conversation -- obviously we're not including wine in the ticket price for a Christian organization. But people can buy wine there. And we were asked, should we see if Fleming's will reduce the quality of the wine on their wine list? No. We're not going to do that. These people can afford an $85 bottle of wine. And they're paying for it at the table.

David: Those types of things -- no, we're not going to cheap out on this. I notice those things. Cherry Creek Country Club was a serious upgrade. It looks good. And people are like, I want to play that course. I can't play that course because it's a private course. So this is an opportunity for me to go play.

Jeff: 100%. And as you're thinking about what you spend and what you do in the future, you're going to be responsible about it. Of course. But you're going to take some risks.

David: We have to. And I think that's what's exciting about it because when you take those risks, you just never know what's going to happen. We're going to elevate the Top Golf event next year. That's 100% happening.

Jeff: That's an event we should talk about. You want to talk about elevated food -- it's not there. So we're going to change it or figure something else out. But that's the whole point.

David: All right. This has been an amazing conversation.

Jeff: Thanks for letting me come out on the chat. This is fun. We'll have to do this again. So thank you guys for listening. Until next time, happy fundraising. If you enjoyed our show, please take a moment to leave us a review. You can find us on Apple, Google, and Spotify. Don't forget to subscribe for more great content. And if you're a fan of video, check us out on YouTube. Until next time, happy fundraising.