Survivors' Poetry

Arts charity Survivors Poetry (SP) was one of around 100 groups to lose its Arts Council funding in 2005, immediately putting the future of the organisation in jeopardy. Little funding was available beyond March 2006 and the charity faced the prospect of either closing down or scaling its operation right back.

SP approached us in late 2005 to see if we could raise emergency funding to keep it afloat. We felt this would be a challenging assignment, but greed to help.

Focusing on charitable trusts, we carried out research to identify potential funders, developed the case for support and helped make contact with the best prospects.

After meetings with funders and an agonizing wait, the results started to come in. £20,000 from one foundation and £40,000 from another were enough to secure the immediate survival of the charity, giving it space to plan its future and regain some stability. As a result of this funding, the Arts Council relented and awarded Survivors' Poetry annual funding of £55,000 per year.

The charity now has the chance to plan for the future and begin to rebuild its work. Its Director, Dr Simon Jenner, said "We were facing a very bleak future - if we had one at all - and knew we needed specialist help. So we turned to Wootton George Consulting. Their consultant Andrew Devon worked closely with us and was very clear about what we had to do to secure funding. Their approach has worked and has given us space now to plan our future with more certainty. We are delighted with what has been achieved and would happily recommend them to other charities!"

In late 2008 we were retained again by Survivors' Poetry to do further work on sustainable funding for the charity, involving prospect research, development of a new case for support and bid writing.