Harold Sumption

Harold Sumption (26 November 1916 - 18 March 1998) was an English advertising executive and fundraiser. He was associated with charities including Oxfam, Help the Aged and ActionAid, as well as co-founding the International Fundraising Workshop (IFRW).

A committed Quaker, Sumption served as Oxfam's unpaid advertising adviser from the late 1940s until the late 1980s, and his advice was instrumental in making Oxfam the largest charity in the UK. the "inventor of Marketing 1.0" and the "shy pioneer" who was "the biggest influence on a generation of British fundraisers".

Personal life and career Born in Culmstock, the son of a Devon farmer, Harold Sumption moved to London in the early 1930s to an apprenticeship at an advertising agency.

In 1938 he married Ruth Burrows at the Friends meeting house in Wellington, Somerset.

During the Second World War, he was a conscientious objector, and suffered a severe return of the tuberculosis that had infected him before the war. Sumption advised Oxfam for the next 35 years, serving as advertiser, council member, and board member, although he was never on the organisation's payroll. He was a fellow and council-member of the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising,

Fundraising influence

Sumption's fundraising was informed by the belief that every person has a Good Samaritan within them, but that they need to be shown with clarity, honesty and urgency how and why to exercise that Samaritan instinct. and in 1963, to commemorate Oxfam's 21st birthday, he helped orchestrate the first multimedia charity campaign, Oxfam's "Hunger £ Million", which included a bread-and-water lunch in London's Trafalgar Square, pop stars collecting pound notes on spear-points, and the involvement of the Beatles.

In 1979 he co-founded the International Fundraising Workshop (now the Resource Alliance).

1960s advert for Help the Aged, by Harold Sumption, with the text: "Make a blind man see £10" He condensed his advice to those who followed him into fundraising into a number of aphorisms: Fundraising is not about money. It's about important work that needs doing. If you start by asking for money, you won't get it and you won't deserve it. The charity is the agent of the donor. Open their hearts, open their minds, then open their wallets. Present the need, powerfully, not to shock but to engage. Keep the message simple: the need and what the reader can do. People give to people, not to organisations, mission statements or strategies. Clever copy doesn't work. Produce ads that were made to look as if they had been put together by dedicated amateurs on the scullery table. Make public relations, press ads and direct mail all sing together. Testing, testing, testing. Those who give, give. Those that don't, don't. The most important two words are "thank you". Acknowledge every donation with a friendly, personal letter. Give larger donors special treatment. Share your failures as well as your successes. A complainant, well handled, will be your most loyal donor.