The direct mail, door drops and household deliveries showcase

Congratulations! You’ve just found the world’s best and biggest collection of fundraising direct mail, right here on sofii.org. There are more than 160 detailed case histories and articles here for you to learn from, crib from, adapt or copy. And lots more besides. Enjoy!

Click here for the full contents and index for SOFII’s direct mail showcase. 

The summary report of the Commission on the Donor Experience into direct mail fundraising can be found here.

Deerfield Academy: Bruce Barton’s fundraising letters from 1946/47, letters 6, 7 and 8

by SOFII

Featured here are letters six, seven and eight from the 21 letters in this SOFII series, three more fine examples of the fundraising letter-writer's art from an age gone by.

Read more

Deerfield Academy: Bruce Barton’s fundraising letters from 1945, letters 3, 4 and 5

by SOFII

These letters are masterful examples of wrapping up serious information in easy conversational style. Find letters three, four and five here.

Read more

A profile of Mal Warwick: America’s genial guru of fundraising direct mail

by Christiana Stergiou

What we at SOFII have to say about this guy.

Read more

Deerfield Academy: Bruce Barton’s fundraising letters from the 1940s, letters 1 and 2

The Bruce Barton Letters

by SOFII

Written between 1944 and 1960, the 22 letters in this series reputedly raised over US$2 million. Serious direct mail copywriters will study these letters carefully and will profit accordingly.

Read more

Deerfield Academy: the Bruce Barton classic long copy letter from 1925 that pulled a 100 per cent response

Left: Barton addresses an audience, perhaps at Deerfield Academy (we have no idea). And at home with a friend, right.

by Carolina Herrera

He sounds like the racy detective hero from a 1930s crime thriller. But Bruce Barton is something else, for sure – a great copywriter and communicator.

Read more

The Wishing Well Appeal for Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital

by SOFII

It's difficult to do justice to a capital campaign as wide, and complex. This is a condensed summary of a major capital campaign which, at the time, was the largest appeal ever mounted in the UK.

Read more

How I wrote it: the ActionAid iguana letter

by Fergal Byrne & Aline Reed

Are you sitting down to write your next appeal? In this article, Aline Reed takes you through a letter she wrote in 2005. It was part of ActionAid UK’s long-running mid-value donor programme. Aline explains her approach to writing stories that move donors to action, and offers hints and tips that will help you to do the same. 

Read more

British Red Cross: the £7.7 billion appeal that changed British fundraising forever

by SOFII

The Duke of Gloucester’s Red Cross and St John Appeal Fund is the largest charitable fund in the history of British fundraising, raising the equivalent of £7.7 billion. This monumental exhibit should be read by all.

Read more

Reverse Book Club cold acquisition pack: Books change lives

by SOFII

Book Aid International’s latest donor acquisition mailing package, created by them with UK marketing and communications agency Catalyst.

Read more

How I wrote it: the Sharp HospiceCare conversion letter

by Fergal Byrne & Tom Ahern

In the first of this SOFII series of interviews with leading fundraising writers, Fergal Byrne talks to Tom Ahern about a letter he wrote in 2002 for Sharp HospiceCare. Here Tom tells Fergal how he wrote this letter, explains his approach and takes us through the letter step by step.

Read more

Book Aid International: the Reverse Book Club

by SOFII

This medium level structured monthly giving scheme is a good example of a fundraising product that has been specifically designed to fit the needs of donors to a very particular and specific cause.

Read more

Farm Africa: a thank-you letter and gift

Farm Africa thank you letter and coffee beans.

by SOFII

This is just a very nice thank-you letter that is easy to copy, though perhaps it would be best not to do so directly, but rather to adapt the idea behind it in a way that’s distinctive, individual and personal to your cause.

Read more