Structuring giving tiers is a conversation that arts organizations often revisit, and are especially relevant today when typical donor benefits are limited by pandemic closures. ABA scanned the donor tiers of arts institutions across genres and countries to see what connections we would find between the makeup of these giving levels and arts organizations’ fundraising income.

Outlier data points have been removed from the graphs below.

Contributed Income Correlates With Some Components Of Tier Organization  

We looked at the average contributed income across three years at each organization surveyed, and compared it to several elements of donor tier organization. We found that organizations with higher minimum donations for what is considered a “major gift,” as well as those with a greater number of separate donor tiers, tended to be the organizations that brought in higher amounts of contributed income. These organizations also were often larger in size (budget, number of employees), which could potentially lead to a higher number of donors and more flexibility -- or higher ceilings -- when creating tiers. 

We also noticed much higher degrees of variation in the number of tiers of organizations with lower contributed incomes, ranging from 6 to 15 tiers in institutions that bring in under $5 million. Donor tier structures are certainly not a “one size fits all of one size” decision.

No Clear Connection Between Giving Minimums and Fundraising Income

A connection did not appear as readily between the three-year average income and the minimum amount a donor must give in order to receive benefits (ranging from being thanked in the performance program to more tangible benefits such as invitations or access to lounges). We found organizations across sizes of contributed income that offered specific benefits to donors who gave as little as $1, and others who required higher levels of giving to access these more tangible offerings.

Raising More Funds Does Not Always Signify Greater Efficiency

Finally, we explored efficiency in fundraising departments based on their dollars raised per fundraising expense. While there is an expected correlation between organizations with large contributed income and large expenditures on fundraising, there was a surprising lack of a strong relationship between amount of funds raised and efficiency of spending. In fact, some of the organizations with the most dollars raised per fundraising expense were those that overall raised an average of $5 million or less.

ABA continues to conduct research on arts donors and philanthropy. Find more insights in our Donor and Government Engagement Center.