Notes from 11/14/12 Culture Bytes on Corporate Sponsorships

Questar (Deborah Hoyt)

• Mission and guidelines for giving are posted online: http://www.questar.com/4EnvironmentCommunity/CorporateGiving.php
• They are focused on contributing to a healthy environment and improving the community.
• They have three corporate giving pots: - arts, education, and Native American.  
• Between community giving and matching gifts they give $2 million locally every year.   Questar is made up of three companies, not just Questar Gas.  
• There is no giving deadline - it is year round - and the "trifecta" for them is an opportunity that can involve employees, has good impact, and can provide recognition.
• Asks/applications are reviewed by a giving committee.
• Marketing/sponsorship dollars are handled by someone other than Deborah.

Zions Bank (Rob Brough)

• ZB has two kinds of funding: sponsorships and charitable giving
• The charitable giving committee comprised of Scott Anderson, Rob Brough and and Gloria Wilkinson
• Applications/asks go first to Gloria Wilkinson, she establishes the agenda for the giving committee, she’s the one who determines if it makes it onto the giving committee agenda for review by the broader commmittee
• They don’t invite guests to make presentations to make presentations to the committee, but Gloria is willing to meet with you and visit your organization
• With both sponsorship and giving, they also have regional committees for things happening outside the Wasatch Front and Utah. Each region has their own committees and their own pull of funds between sponsorships and charitable giving
• Question was asked: how does ZB define sponsorship vs. giving | A: Typically if it’s a contribution to a c3 they classify it as a donation, but other times if they’re doing it principally for large donations it may go through the sponsorship side (it’s really up to Zions Bank to decide which way they’re going to do it through). The lines get blurred a lot, it’s really more of an internal designation. Table sponsorships are generally on the donation side. if there’s every any doubt on your side if it should go through their sponsorship or donation side, send it to Rob or Gloria to look over first.

Couple of things that ZB looks for:

1. What is the impact of the contribution (the number of people who are impacted, what good the org is doing)?
2. What’s the benefit to Zions Bank?
3. Are there employees who are involved in the organization or involved on the board, that is important to ZB
4. Does ZB have clients who are coming to them and saying, “You should support this group?”
5. What opportunity is there to give benefits to ZB clients as a result of our donation? Get creative. (one of the most important factors that they look at)

Union Pacific Railroad/Foundation (Dan Harbecke)

• Dan is Director of Public Affairs with Union Pacific Railroad. He is the public face of the company across the region. Manages government affairs, city relations, as well as all the sponsorship and charitable giving.
• UPR is headquarted in Nebraska, nations largest railroad
• Celebrating 150th anniversary, and over that time they’ve done sponsorship and giving, but by being 100% freight they’d gotten away from charitable giving and sponsorships. 5 years ago they came together and started to dramatically increase their sponsorships and charitable giving.
• Two forms of giving: sponsorships and union pacific foundation
• UPR doesn’t have a lot of employees in Utah who can sit on boards and be engaged in your organization. Dan does serve on a couple of boards, and they do want to be a part of directing where the organization goes as well, but his board time is pretty stretched.
• UPR don’t like to mix the sponsorships and foundation dollars.

Sponsorships: first 1/2: memberships, chamber of commerce, tax groups; second 1/2: rodeos, festivals, events, etc., especially in many of the small towns that they operate in. UPR saves it more for city-wide type celebrations

Foundation: in 2008 the giving number was 85-90K now it’s 150K

• give it primarily to 501c3’s, spread around 53 organizations mostly. Mostly 2500 grants so far. Focus on education and arts, although recently they’re weighing more towards health & human services. There’s no right number for how many organizations they give to. Some years they do bigger grants to fewer orgs, and some years smaller grants to more orgs
• Foundation Grant applications open in May, close in August
• http://www.up.com/found/index.shtml
• Process: around november Dan receives the applications, his budget number, and in February makes the announcement and then gives the checks out through mid summer. They like to give for program services more than tables at fundraisers or operational funds.

AUDIENCE Q&A:

Q: is the UPR time frame of opening the applications in May and closing in August typical?

A: 

• UPR: Works for their budget year, has to be approved by board of directors in January. This is only for the foundation. In terms of sponsorships, we’re always willing to sit down and meet. Say, a city wants to do a 4th of July parade, we’re willing to look at that.
• ZB: We don’t really have a cycle. we meet as a giving committee every 4 - 6 weeks. If we get a request for an event coming up in 2 weeks, the answer is almost always no. Ideally, we like a couple of months notice. We don’t necessarily have a cycle, we review them throughout the year.
• Questar: we don’t have a cycle either, we take requests year round, however if you’re making a short request for a close event, or too close into the end of the year, we’ll likely say no or defer it until the next year. Deborah will do email polls with her committee, but prefers to look at applications in person around the table.

Q: Could each of you give an example of creative recognition?

A:

• ZB: we have a strong partnership with the Larry Miller companies in many ways. Through the sponsorship side we have a partnership with the Megaplex Theatres. If you use your ZB debit or credit card at concessions, you get a free upgrade to the large (plus the ads ZB buys on their screens). It’s part of an added value for our memberships. Broadway Across America - Utah offers advance ticket sales to people who bank with ZB. Anything that’s unique that allows us to provide added value to our clients such as early access, etc. Discounts are not necessarily creative enough.
• Questar: we have a strong volunteer program. Our perfect scenario is to give both funds through a program, engage our employees in a volunteer effort, and get sponsorship recognition, that’s the perfect trifecta for us. We all represent companies that are strong in the community, you want to get your name out there in the community, we strive to do the same thing. The better the partnership, the better we can do that. Look for strategic efforts. We can’t give away a product away (natural gas). We give through our marketing efforts. Like to sponsor home builders and things with promoting Thermwise. We like to be known for conservation because it’s smart for our future longevity. Giving budget, plus foundation is separate from the marketing/sponsorship. 
• Upr: we definitely want to receive something. We want to get our name out, our employees live all over the place. For Days of 47 we’ve been sponsoring the kids parade. We used our small train there.  A Symphony (not Utah Symphony, some other group), had Dan contact an orchestra in front of 2500. A lot of stuff in the field falls to Dan personally since they don’t have a lot of employees in Utah/Idaho. That was fun and unique in the sponsorship side. For the foundation side, they can’t get things in exchange. No tickets, etc. Logo can be all over the place, but not hard gifts like tickets. For one program they give to through the foundation, their dollars help sponsor some performances for kids. They gave a big oversized check in front of those kids as part of the exposure.

Q: Once you give someone money, how do you like an org to report the use of your funds?

A:

• Questar: no matter the amount (especially larger), there needs to be feedback and reporting/accounting for how you used these funds. Always extend a thank you to your donor. That goes a long way. If I give $5,000 but never hear from them again until they want funds again, that makes me less inclined to support them in the future if there hasn’t been any connection, no follow up, no contact. 
• ZB: Rob is surprised how often there isn’t a follow up from an organization. At least make an effort to give an accounting of what you used it for. The likelihood of getting accepted again in the future. They love it when someone takes the time to sit down and give them an accounting in person to Rob and in that meeting there isn’t an ask for next time, it’s just showing them what you did. It doesn’t have to be an in-person, it can be a letter. Two pet peeves: 1) show appreciation 2) give an update on the organization. The more you can update Rob on whats happening, the better.
• UPR: we are accountable to our company, employees, and share holders. So the appreciation really helps. Don’t need a huge 10 page report on how you used the funds. They’ve even put a word cap on the application itself too. No formal follow up, but they do like to hear from the companies. You ought to be doing the informal follow up, email/letter now and then. Breakfast, coffee etc. Be respectful of our time. Foundation/sponsorship takes only 25% of Dan’s time. Keep that in mind. 

Q: do each of you consider giving for operational support or program related giving only?

• Questar: depends on the organization asking. We usually like to give for the programs themselves, but we do give to organizational support to a few organizations.
• ZB: will give operational but they don’t like to give funding to pay for a specific employee or position.
• UPR: some don’t have a lot of programs so it does depend on the organization, but for the most part they’re not in the business of helping you get computers and pay salaries.