Lutheran Services Seeks to Raise Profile, Quietly

On a recent business trip, Jill A. Schumann, president of Lutheran Services in America, told the man

seated next to her on an airport shuttle bus that she was on her way to a gathering of Lutheran groups that provide social services.

“He told me he didn’t know the Lutherans did health and human-services work,” she recalls. “I said, ‘We’re the largest social-service provider in the country.’”

“Gee,” the man told her, “You really keep it a secret.”

But not for much longer. Lutheran Services in America is No. 4 on this year’s Philanthropy 400 list of the charities that raise the most from private sources, taking in $849-million last year. It says its total income — $7.7-billion — makes it larger than any other social-services provider.

Lutheran Services in America is a relatively new organization, formed five years ago to unite all the human-service charities run by the two largest branches of the Lutheran church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Many of the group’s 280 members say they are the largest social-service providers in their states, serving more clients than any other organization. They offer a broad range of services, including care for the elderly and children and refugee and adoption services. In fiscal 2001, the groups served 5.8 million clients, one of every 50 people in the United States.

But despite its size, Lutheran Services in America remains less well-known than peers such as Catholic Charities USA, in part the result of a culture that encourages Lutherans to keep their giving private and to play down their church ties in order to be more inclusive. The majority of the clients of Lutheran Services affiliates are not Lutheran.

The organization’s challenge now is to overcome that modesty, which is hurting efforts to expand its pool of donors both among and beyond Lutherans, influence public policy, and reach more clients and potential employees.

“We need to tell our story,” Ms. Schumann says. “It’s important to invite people to use these services, to partner with us, volunteer with us, work with us, and to be generous with their contributions.”

Lobbying Government

Lutheran Services in America, which has its headquarters in Baltimore, is attempting to raise its profile through such activities as lobbying the federal government on issues affecting the needy, such as Medicare and housing, and compiling data on member charities to help convey a true picture of their collective size. More careful counting, in fact, this year brought Lutheran Services into the top 10 of the Philanthropy 400 for the first time, as the group made a more rigorous effort to consolidate fund-raising totals of all its members. At the same time, local Lutheran charities are also striving to become better known, fighting the institutional bias against self-promotion.

Lutheran Social Services of Wisconsin and Upper Michigan, Wisconsin’s biggest nonprofit social-service provider, is running television and radio advertisements to let people know about the services it provides, after discovering last year that only 4 to 6 percent of the people it surveyed had ever heard of it. Even among Lutherans, only one-third knew of the organization. “We were called the quiet giant,” says David N. Larson, the group’s president. “Everywhere we went, people said, ‘I didn’t know you did that.’ We’re very shy about shouting when we’re doing good things.”

But, concerned about the need to attract more donors and high-quality employees, the group began discussing a campaign to help people become familiar with its work.

“We spent a lot of time talking about it to make sure staff understood and boards were behind this,” Mr. Larson said. “The response was, ‘This is a good thing you’re doing. You’re telling the story that’s been quiet for so long.’” The ads focus on people helped by the agencies: a child who’s been adopted, a disabled man living in a group home, a woman who overcame a drug addiction and finished school. The television ads, for which the group bought air time instead of relying on donated time in order to ensure they would reach the maximum audience, cost $500,000, including production. While it will be at least a year before the group can measure the success of its ad campaign, Mr. Larson says he is encouraged by calls so far on the group’s toll-free number, which was included in the ads.

Although the Wisconsin organization received $2.7-million in gifts in 2001, up about a quarter of a million dollars over the previous year, the need for social services continues to increase, and the group wants to make sure its foundation, the endowment arm of the organization, established in 1998, continues to grow. “It was clear most of our funding was hand-to-mouth,” Mr. Larson says. “We realized to better serve customers, we needed a more dependable source of income.”

Getting Publicity

In St. Louis, Lutheran Family and Children’s Services of Missouri sought broader public recognition through its “Chair-ity” Auction. The organization displayed decorated chairs and other donated artwork that used a chair theme, along with brochures, in local shopping malls, and then auctioned off the artwork. The project netted $8,000, says Lucille Green, vice president of development. More important, she says, “it was great PR. We got our name out there.”

The family-services organization wants a higher profile in part because it has recently expanded its fund raising beyond St. Louis to the rest of the state. Last year, Family and Child Services hired two more fund raisers, who have been able to build relationships with new donors who gave to its capital campaign, Ms. Green says. The group last year raised $1.9-million for operations, and $2.5-million toward the $12-million capital campaign.

Meanwhile, Lutheran Social Services of Michigan is trying to make itself better known among Lutheran congregations in an effort to attract big donors — those who contribute $500 or more annually. It sought the help of its current major donors, who decided on a low-key approach suited to Lutherans. Major donors visit their own or neighboring congregations around the state, setting up information booths at the informal receptions and educational gatherings that traditionally follow Lutheran Sunday services.

“We’re trying to make a strong but subtle approach for more individual support from donors,” says David Barcus, vice president of development. “We’re trying to demonstrate how individual support is important, how it’s led by major gifts.”

Those gifts may not come this year, he adds, largely due to the turbulent economy. Giving in 2001 was $2.5-million, about the same as 2000, but the number of donors fell while average gift sizes rose.

“We are seeing some of our longtime donors go onto the sidelines, which is very unusual,” Mr. Barcus says.

In the spring, 8 percent of the donors who normally make gifts did not do so. As a result, one goal of the Super Sundays is just to make sure people remember Lutheran Services when they’re feeling more financially able to give again, he says. While the economy appears to be recovering, “it’s going to be a year before people regain their confidence,” Mr. Barcus says.

Some Lutheran groups that have begun to raise their profile report that their work is paying off.

Despite the bad economy, Lutheran Social Services of Illinois realized a 33-percent increase in charitable support last year to about $6.5-million, says Paul Brinkman, the organization’s vice president for resource development. Four years ago, he began airing public-service announcements explaining the group, and also ran some newspaper ads. He made sure that every organization that was part of Lutheran Social Services displayed its logo prominently in their signs. Lutheran Social Services also now underwrites Lutheran radio shows in exchange for a mention at the beginning and end of the program.

While such efforts have increased Lutheran Social Services’ visibility, “I think some of our older constituents in the Lutheran church are still a little uncomfortable with it,” says Mr. Brinkman. “But they also see that it’s doing good.”