Building the Fundraising Infrastructure
Behind Animal Welfare
Halifax Humane Society partnered with Sharity to strengthen its fundraising approach and align internal systems with the scale of its animal welfare operations. The work focused on building structured major gift and grant programs, improving donor data visibility, and connecting fundraising activity across events, finance, and donor engagement.
The Outcome
Halifax implemented a more structured development model, including major donor identification, a formal grant-seeking function, and a full CRM migration. This contributed to a record-breaking Fur Ball gala generating $537,501 and the submission of $160,000 in grant applications to major funders.
Meet the Organization
Halifax Humane Society serves as the primary animal welfare organization in Volusia County, Florida.
Its work is broad, daily, and operationally intensive. The organization cares for approximately 350 animals each day, supports roughly 6,000 adoptions annually, and completes about 9,000 spay and neuter surgeries each year.
As demand and costs continued to rise, leadership recognized the need for a fundraising system that could better support the scale and consistency of the work.
The organization already had strong community trust and meaningful donor relationships. The next step was building the infrastructure to make fundraising more visible, coordinated, and sustainable.
Setting the Stage
Strong Community Support Ready for Stronger Systems
At the time of engagement, Halifax Humane Society’s fundraising efforts were active but not fully integrated across systems.
Donor data was housed in eTapestry, which limited segmentation, reporting, and visibility. Major gift cultivation was not yet formalized. Grant-seeking was happening without a dedicated function. Event, donor, and financial data were not connected within one operating structure.
Several priorities shaped the engagement:
- Making donor data easier to access, segment, and use
- Identifying high-capacity donor prospects for major gift cultivation
- Creating a formal grant-seeking process
- Connecting event revenue and sponsorship activity to donor records
- Aligning development systems with financial reporting
The question was how to move fundraising from active effort into a more structured and trackable operating system.
Major Gift Strategy
Moving From Opportunity to Cultivation
Sharity introduced a more structured approach to major donor development.
Using wealth screening and RDK data analysis, the team identified 104 high-capacity donor prospects. This gave Halifax a clearer view of who had the capacity and potential alignment to support the organization at a larger level.
- The strategy also included a dedicated cultivation event in October 2024, designed to engage top-tier donors outside the annual gala environment.
- A $500,000 major gift goal was defined to guide future campaign planning and help leadership build a more intentional donor pipeline.
This created a framework for ongoing relationship development rather than one-time solicitation.
Grant Program Development
Building Institutional Funding Capacity
Sharity also helped establish a formal grant-seeking function to support revenue diversification.
The work included:
- Submission of $160,000 in grant applications, including $90,000 to ASPCA and $70,000 to PetSmart Charities
- A structured outreach plan to reconnect with past funders and rebuild institutional relationships
- A master grant tracking worksheet
- Agency fact sheets to support consistent grant writing and reporting
Early funding was also secured from the Goldberg Family Foundation.
These tools gave Halifax a clearer foundation for sustaining grant activity beyond the initial engagement.
CRM Migration & Data Alignment
Making Donor Information Usable
A central part of the engagement was the migration from eTapestry to Summa Go.
The goal was not simply to move data from one system to another. It was to create a more usable donor and financial infrastructure.
The migration included:
- Cleaning and validating donor and transaction data
- Transferring records prior to launch
- Aligning general ledger codes
- Integrating accounting structures within the new CRM
- Preparing the system for donor, event, and financial reporting
The new system was fully operational by October 1, 2024.
This created a centralized place to track donor activity, financial data, engagement history, event participation, and future cultivation opportunities.
Event & System Integration
Connecting Fundraising Moments to Long-Term Relationships
The Fur Ball gala was also connected to the updated fundraising infrastructure.
A dedicated microsite was built for the event, and registration and sponsorship transactions were integrated directly into the CRM.
This ensured that event activity did not sit apart from donor strategy. Revenue, sponsorships, registrations, and engagement history could now inform future cultivation.
The result was a stronger connection between one of the organization’s most visible fundraising moments and its broader donor development system.
Real-World Outcomes
A More Trackable Development System
The engagement helped Halifax Humane Society build a clearer, more coordinated foundation for fundraising.
Key outcomes included:
- $537,501 generated by the 14th Annual Fur Ball, the highest total in the organization’s history
- $160,000 in grant applications submitted to major funders
- Early grant funding secured from the Goldberg Family Foundation
- 104 major donor prospects identified through wealth screening and segmentation
- Full CRM migration completed and operational by October 1, 2024
- Donor, financial, and event tracking integrated into the updated system
- A formal grant tracking process and reusable agency materials created for ongoing use
These changes gave the organization more than individual fundraising wins. They created a stronger structure for planning, tracking, and sustaining revenue over time.
Read more about the impact here.
IMPACT SINCE IMPLEMENTATION
Record-breaking 14th Annual Fur Ball
Grant applications submitted
High-capacity donor prospects identified
What We Learned
As mission-driven organizations grow, fundraising depends increasingly on the systems beneath the work.
Donor relationships, events, grants, and financial reporting are often managed separately, even when they are part of the same revenue picture. Bringing those elements into a shared structure creates better visibility and more consistent decision-making.
For Halifax Humane Society, strengthening the fundraising infrastructure made it easier to connect community generosity to the daily operational realities of animal welfare.