Fundcraft Publishes Cookbooks to Raise Funds
Back in the early 1940s, a small family-owned cookbook publishing firm in rural Kansas got the idea to put together a special cookbook with local recipes that would serve as a fundraising vehicle for a nearby Methodist church.
By the 1950s, Fundcraft Publishing had become a leader in cookbook publishing for churches, individuals and civic groups around the country, typing more than 50,000 cookbook recipes each week and working with more than 8,000 groups each year. Today the company, which markets primarily through direct mail, has a database of more than 1 million recipes and over 100,000 customers, says vice president Chris Bradley.
Fundcraft collects local recipes from the groups and then creates professional-looking cookbooks at prices ranging from about $2 to $8 per page that the groups can sell locally to raise funds, says Bradley, who notes those groups can often make 50% profit on the sale of those books.
In the past several years, the company — now located in Collierville, TN outside Memphis — went online, with www.cookbooks.com, www.cookbooksonline.com and www.fundcraft.com. Collectively, the sites attract more that 100,000 visitors each week, Bradley notes.
However, the company still markets itself primarily through direct mail, sending about 50,000 pieces per year to church groups and other small fundraising organizations. It gets between a 3% and 4% response to these mailings, says Bradley.
The firm has tried e-mail marketing but finds direct mail much more to its liking.
“E-mail lists are so much more expensive than regular lists, except for junk lists and if you send to them, you tend to get people angry,” Bradley says.
