Organisation: Acme Subject: Funding Strategy Date: October 2007 Background Acme is a SME support organisation and registered

charity located at New Cross Road, New Cross Borough of Lewisham. ACME is run by a 12 member management committee comprised of members of the local SME community, currently chaired by Dr Nooralhaq Nasimi. ACMEs projects include General Counselling ESOL classes Family Support in Integration Supplementary school Regular social & cultural events & outings Business and Employment Advice Publication of a quarterly magazine in both Farsi and English

ACMEs income profile suggests core costs (office rent and other fixed operational expenses) of 8.6K or 10% of 2005/06 annual expenditure of 71K. Project costs for the same period represented 90% of ACMEs total expenditure. ACME relies heavily on only 2 major funders; the NDC which ends in 2011 & the Parenting Fund ending in 2008 which both account for 60% of the organisations total income. ACME is funded primarily by a Big Lottery Fund grant. Despite its development into a major player in the lewisham voluntary community, ACME remains very much a one man organisation with a local base. The organisation now needs to develop sustainably in order to meet the challenges of new funding and continue delivering services. ACME is finding it increasingly difficult to operate since as its grows its client base its funding needs also grow . To continue operations, the organisation now has to compete with bigger, more established organisations for a rapidly diminishing pot of funds. This combination of growing its services and beneificiaries and no track record of attracting large funders other than Big Lottery funding leaves ACME with little capacity for developing a comprehensive funding strategy. ACME should aim to develop a more sustainable balance of funding sources by employing the following approaches: Apportioning overheads across project budgets Retaining original funders. Attracting new funders. Develop independent income streams Cost Reduction/ Minimisation

Apportioning Overheads across Project Budgets ACMEs should spread as much of its overheads across as much of its project activity and expenditure as possible. ACMEs current reliance on 2 key funders regularly leaves it unable to plan and is a regular source of distraction to the management. ACME should allocate the costs of its projects towards covering core costs. This should allow the organisation to develop more

sustainably on a project funded basis. For example the project coordinators salary could be allocated across all its projects based on the number of man hours used to carry out activities. Core costs can be allocated to different projects in a number of ways. For example, where you have a programme manager who manages multiple projects 33% of her salary could be charged to each project.

Retaining original funders. ACME is now in a position to leverage its delivery record, its developing capacity and active role in the local community, to encourage funders to continue supporting the organisation. ACME should employ tactics aimed at keeping exisiting funders as engaged as possible and to encourage them to increase their contributions. Suggested tactics include Continue to acknowledge the contributions of all funders and supporters in the organisations magazine, the website and at events. Demonstrate greater transparency in using funds to stakeholders. Explain how funds were spent and how you plan to spend any future sums.

Attracting new funders. To attract new funders ACME will need to attract new potential funders. These funders will need to be researched and plans developed for approaching each according to their stipulated guidelines. ACME should attain all relevant accreditations required to qualify as a service provider for the wide range of services it currently provides. For example; o o o The delivery of general advice and counselling requires the Matrix accreditation Customer First is typically required by funders and agencies for the delivery of business support. The delivery of legal advice and counselling often requires the CLS Kite mark.

To overcome potential objections arising from ACMEs limited manpower capacity the organisation should try to work in partnership with other groups in order to complement its delivery capacity. ACME should document their record of working in partnership with organisations such as the Local Council, the local Police, Goldsmiths College, Etc. Since the SME community lewisham is relatively small (i.e. under 3%) ACME should look to broaden its target group of beneficiaries to include other non SME as well as appropriate non SME groups. This will help to strengthen its percieved impact in the community by stakeholders and potential funders. Also this approach is very appropriate and timely since less and less funding is available for SME support activities. ACME should utilise its new customer database to develop a profile of its community stakeholders, identify potential funders in this group, determine their needs and focus on addressing these needs to solicit funding.