Quarterly Report October 2020
Financials
Were emailed to board members. Key highlights
We are in the black by $45k, but….
We have received $16k more in money taken in this year, but expenses are drastically up $35k more than last year so our “income” has gone down. The bulk of that is our spay and neuter expenses which are $32k more this year than last year. ($16k versus $48k).
Adoptions
Adoptions 502 as of Oct 18. We have already surpassed our 430 adoptions for last year and may hit 600 for the year.
Fundraisers
Many fundraisers are still on hold.
Flatbread we made $2706. Pretty good considering covid! We received a counterfeit $50 bill or the total would have been $2756. Having a link for tickets to pay online was helpful. We received $650 from Flatbread for pizza sales, sold 97 packs of 30 tickets for $20 and 21 packs of 7 tickets for $5. The rest was single tickets, donations and twig sales.
Going to do Giving Tuesday. (Rachel)
T-shirt sales ended Sept 30, 130 shirts sold, raised $1300
Calendar sales going well. Every time we post on social media we seem to get about 10 sales.
Current auction just ended, should raise about $850. Rachel and Suzanne are in the process of mailing out items. It works well having the system mail out winner notifications with payment links.
Virtual 5k totals- $4402.14 (Rachel to confirm)
Decals- we sold a bunch of decals, but many orders were not fulfilled and cannot be fulfilled. Suzanne is contacting people to see who didn’t get their orders and issuing refunds.
Development Committee Update:
Rachel and Jenna are working on the pumpkin decorating competition Oct 21-31st. Penelopads has donated a prize that Dawn will send to the winner. This will be for fun and isn’t looking to raise funds.
Dawn and Jenna are working on a scavenger hunt for November. We are currently narrowing down a platform to use- Jenna and Dawn to finalize- Scavr or Let’s Roam. Let’s Roam uses a pre-filled template that we can customize with our assigned support to tailor, including a message/video from Suzanne to welcome and thank everyone for supporting us. We need to consider prizes/ possible “sign up” item to promote signing up for this event. Could be holiday themed as well.
Spa Day- 48 bunnies attended 10/17 and we have another 48 signed up for 10/25. Event on 10/17 raised $1020. Devine (Palestina) will have Spa Day 11/8 and they are charging $15 per bunny. Excited to offer again on the South Shore- we’ll plan at least 2 more spa days yearly to coincidence with our larger events. Though we have many of the same supporters signed up, many of our regulars did not sign up for the smaller events (could also be concern over COVID).
1/23 “Everything Happens for a Reason” will do a purse/gift card” online bingo event. There is a $1200 expense check due a week before and DeAnna takes 18 percent of our sales as her profit. We can easily do well with this- the event for Sweet Pea was a lot of fun.
We will be meeting monthly with our next meeting 11/8 at 8 pm. Ideas to discuss include “Holiday Shop” and possible holiday photos as well as t-shirt sales.
The committee has decided on annual fundraisers to include: A Plush is Enough (Easter), Calendar sales, yearly t-shirt design, 5K. Flatbread, Spa Days, online auctions. (Bunny Hop)
Thinking forward on 20th Anniversary and Bunfest 2022.
Looking for more members to join the committee. Lesley created a form and we have a few leads for this. Great job, Lesley!
Grants
Received HRS $1000 emergency grant
Going to submit a second HRN grant for the Linden rescue.
Sent in final grant reports for Petco Grant and MAC grants.
Submitted new grant application for Petco
Had volunteers send in nominations for Oxbow, Tractor Supply and Petco Holiday Wishes
We did not get Oxbow or Tractor Supply. 6 entries for Petco Holiday Wishes- will find out around Dec 1
Shelter
Still closed, need to discuss keeping it or if/when to reopen. Hiring a shelter manager is on hold. Also limited number of rabbits available to put in the shelter. It does feel like we are starting to catch up and may have enough rabbits to make the shelter useable again. Would need to discuss adoptions from the shelter. Shelter is small, airflow at the shelter is poor, not ideal for visitors to meet bunnies. Since shifts are done individually, taking care of buns at the shelter should work fine.
Donation Management/Outreach
Abbey is working on email follow up to a select group of people that did not respond to the covid appeal emails that were sent out in June. $3,994.50 (Givebox)
Foster Homes
Foster Committee has been established including Lindsay Franklin and Franny McKeever. We had our first meeting and have discussed keeping foster homes engaged (a Facebook group for ACTIVE foster homes only has been created), checking in with them, and discussed a checklist for fosters to use to evaluate health of their buns. Lesley is helping us to develop a foster home application for new foster home inquiries. Surrenders and intakes have been high and a wait time of 2-3 weeks is still about the time before a foster home is available, with some homes able to accommodate emergency intakes still. Spays and Neuters are increasing as other hospitals are opening up and offering us surgical dates.
Hotline:
New hotliners: Ellen Kushner, Kate Collins, Same Faso (came back).
The summer was BUSY with almost 200 applications.
Started a monthly report with some stats – started collecting the number of applications, approval rate, and the number of days between submitting an application and adopting.
See September report here.
Spay/Neuter Van:
Jenna has done some research and is in the process of typing up her notes so she, Palestina, and Lesley can meet and discuss what is known and what needs to be figured out. Thoughts on timeline of spay/neuter van with timeline of a brick and mortar shelter?
Outreach
Submitted a video for Pet Rock.
We have registered for VegFest, Jenna is currently working with.
Jenna is currently looking into other virtual programs that we could exhibit with.