Fundraising: why charities love chuggers

Eye contact. Big smile. “Can you spare two minutes?” This is the technique of the cheery chugger, whose job is to get you to sign a direct debit and donate regularly to a charity.

Brought to the UK by Greenpeace in the late 1990s, today there are 40 charities in the UK using chuggers at any one time.

Chugger – a blend of the words charity and mugger – is not a term that charities use. Their preferred description is face-to-face fundraiser, but it all comes down to the same thing. Face-to-face fundraising consists of street fundraisers and those who go to door-to-door.

But are chuggers a useful way for the voluntary sector to recruit supporters who would not otherwise give to charity? Or does their approach risk giving charities a bad name?

There is no doubt that chuggers irritate people. A report on donating to charity in the 21st century, published by nfpSynergy earlier this year, said views canvassed on street fundraising “were usually negative and sometimes quite extreme”.

One person said: “There’re whole gangs of them too many of them. They’re not trustworthy, they are paid, and aggressive. I don’t want to give out my bank details on the street.”

Such views are acknowledged by some in the charity world. Cherie McClintock, donor marketing manager at the Alzheimer’s Society, says negative perceptions of street fundraising have created a “difficult environment” for street fundraisers to work in. “But we continue to try and turn this around,” she adds.

Despite such qualms, the numbers speak for themselves. More than half a million people a year say “yes” when asked by chuggers to donate to charity. The latest figures from the Public Fundraising Regulatory Association show that 210,000 people signed up with street fundraisers and 303,000 on doorsteps in the year ending March 2007.

Young support

The PFRA estimates that 85% of charity supporters recruited by chuggers are under the age of 40, up to three-quarters of whom do not support any other charity.

Social care charities argue that using chuggers to sign up supporters, especially young supporters, is very important to them. Charities also say that chuggers do valuable work raising awareness about the plight of vulnerable people with the public.

“There is still a lot of stigma around mental health issues, which is reflected in the challenges we face when fundraising,” says Caroline Corr, head of donor marketing at mental health charity Mind. “Face-to-face fundraising is crucial. We are able to reach out to people who we would otherwise find it difficult to reach, such as younger people.

“As the latest official statistics show, this group is more likely to hold negative attitudes towards people with mental health problems. So it’s vital that we find accessible ways to increase understanding.”

Raising awareness in turn brings in cash. Chuggers are Mind’s most successful fundraisers. Last year they recruited 2,500 supporters, says Corr, making up a “substantial percentage” of Mind’s income.

NSPCC chuggers signed up more than 7,000 supporters last year, who accounted for nearly 4% of its fundraising income. To date, supporters recruited by chuggers have given more than £16.5m to the children’s charity. The NSPCC says these recruits are a “younger, more affluent type of donor”, and they often give a much higher gift every month – typically £106 a year – than through other methods. Other charities tell a similar story. Scope signed up 6,000 supporters using face-to-face fundraising last year. Mencap has used chuggers since 2000. Michael Naidu, Mencap’s head of donor marketing, says the young people its street recruiters sign up are “unresponsive” to the traditional methods charities use when asking for money.

Cancellation rates

Once these recruits are signed-up, there is nothing to stop them later cancelling their direct debit once left in peace to reflect – and read the small print (see case study).

However, cancellation rates (known as churning levels) are a relatively taboo subject among charities. When we asked 10 charities how long supporters recruited by chuggers stay with them, only the NSPCC gave a clear answer. “After three years, 65% of our donors are still giving to us,” the NSPCC states. “From our first face-to-face fundraising campaign in 2000, 40% of donors are still giving.”

Charities are slightly more open about early cancellation rates. Mencap says between 25% and 40% of donors cancel their direct debit within the first year, Mind says 60% continue after the first 12 months, and the NSPCC says 73% of donors still give after one year.

For the charities, then, chugging is cost-effective compared with other fundraising methods. Clearly there are costs involved in employing teams of chuggers – the Alzheimer’s Society says it costs between £70 and £120 to recruit one supporter – but, for the charities, the return on their investment is good.

Charities cannot afford to be complacent about fundraising. The latest figures in Charity Trends 2007 reveals that donations to social care charities are significantly down, with many people choosing to give to international disasters instead.

As an NSPCC spokesperson puts it: “Some people hate being stopped on the street. But thousands of people don’t mind at all and have signed the direct debit forms to prove it.”

Until people stop signing up with them, chuggers will continue to play a key role in charities’ domestic fundraising efforts.