Wantagh Baptist Church

Wantagh, New York

Challenge: Raise needed funds for new church campus, sanctuary

Thanks to a steady rise in membership over the past two years, Wantagh Baptist Church was quickly outgrowing its 300-seat sanctuary and needed new facilities to handle the growth in attendance at Sunday services, which had grown to more than 500 congregants each week.

When Generis came on board to guide the church's capital campaign in early 2006, Wantagh had already moved some of its people and programs to a new campus in nearby Farmingdale, and was holding its Saturday services in the campus's auditorium. A capital campaign was needed, the church members and leadership decided, to raise funds for a new sanctuary at Farmingdale to handle their size.

But creating a campaign for Wantagh, noted senior pastor Ed Kirkland, required special care. Though it lies in Nassau County, one of the nation's most affluent areas, the church's membership comes from less-than-outsized wealth. "It's very common for people here to have two jobs," he said. "We don't have a church filled with millionaires—these are hard-working people."

Tasks: Construct multi-phased campaign over several years

When Wantagh's leadership selected Generis consultant Tom Melzoni to guide its campaign, it became apparent that because of the church's needs and the price of land available, a campaign of about $10 million would be required to raise the funds needed for property and construction costs.

Naming their campaign "Our Journey," Wantagh's members and leaders worked with Generis to create a phased campaign over a planned six-to-seven-year period. The uniqueness of the campaign, which called for sustained communications with the congregation throughout, made the personal attention Melzoni gave even more important.

"One of the things that Tom did of great significance was serving as a resource, really as a staff member of our church," Kirkland said, adding that his on-site guidance helped make persuading members of the value of the campaign immeasurably easier.

"The pastor has to have trust in the consultant to communicate with your people, that they're going to help your ministry and not hinder it," he added. "I am absolutely convinced without a shadow of a doubt that we would not have received some of the major gifts we received or in the amounts we received, without Tom and Generis involved."

Solution: A campaign that meets its goal, and a positive experience

After weeks of working to communicate its goals and purpose to the membership through the spring of 2006, the first phase of the campaign officially kicked off in May and ended with a Commitment Sunday in mid-June, with a goal of raising $1.5 million toward the construction of a planned 600-seat sanctuary.

That Sunday turned out to be Wantagh's most successful single day of fundraising in its history, Kirkland said, as it raised $1.5 million on that day alone, including a single offering of $300,000. "The really amazing part of that for us was not only the largest amount ever committed at one time for this church, but it had to be one of the largest single offerings ever on Long Island."

Today, the church is well on its way to its goals, with construction on the new sanctuary expected to begin in the summer of 2007 and a move-in date tentatively scheduled for summer 2008.

Individualized Guidance

One of the ways in which Generis's and Melzoni's guidance proved particularly helpful, Kirkland said, was in communicating the need for the campaign among the church's leadership. "He was extremely helpful in leading us and guiding us to do the leadership meetings, in sharing in that presentation with the leaders and talking in detail about ways to give."

Kirkland grew to have such confidence in Melzoni's counsel because the campaign was based on Wantagh's unique needs and goals, designed "from the ground up" to meet his church's needs. "Working with him to do that was just great – we invented a campaign that had a lot of the standard characteristics, but so many of the variables were different."

"I have zero doubt in my mind that Generis cost us nothing when all was said and done," he added. "I have no doubt in my mind that the total cost of our campaign was zero, because I really believe the giving we achieved thanks to Generis exceeded what we could have possibly done, particularly the larger gifts."