A kinder, back-to-basics approach to donor relations amounted to a 30 percent increase in contributions for D.C.’s Heritage Foundation.

By Margaret Battistelli Gardner

As donors move up the giving pyramid, they become eligible for personal visits from Heritage staffers. A $10,000 donor, for example, gets a visit from a senior staff member; $100,000 donors meet with John Von Kannon, vice president and treasurer at Heritage, and foundation president Edwin Feulner once or twice a year. There also are regional events to which donors are invited, including a twice-yearly President’s Club meeting for those on the $1,000 level. Donors don’t pay to attend the information-packed affair, which presents well-known keynote speakers — the list in the past has included Vice President Dick Cheney, conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh and former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher — as well as Heritage staffers discussing foundation issues.