What Season Is Your Monthly Giving Program In? (And Why the Retreat Meets You There)

Monthly Giving Retreat: Learn more + apply by 4/10 here! 

What season is your monthly giving program in right now — planting, growing, or stuck in a plateau? In this episode, Dana Snyder breaks down why knowing your season matters and how the right environment can move your program forward faster than you'd get there alone.

Dana shares an inside look at the 2026 Monthly Giving Retreat — an intimate, women-led gathering for nonprofit fundraising leaders held May 6–8 at The Portal in Serenbe, Georgia. From the peer learning that happens when every person in the room is working on the same thing, to the intentional design of the space itself, this episode makes the case for going deep on one thing instead of a little on everything.

You'll hear real results from past attendees — including one leader who grew from 30 to 105 monthly donors and another who finally invited 17,000 email subscribers to give monthly — and what it actually looks like to leave a retreat with a plan, not just inspiration.

Applications close April 10th. Three spots remain.

Bloomerang is the proud presenter of Missions to Movements. 

See how one team surpassed a $1M match and raised $2.25M for their mission with Penny, Bloomerang’s AI-powered fundraising strategist. Learn more at bloomerang.com.

The Monthly Giving Builder: Generate your comprehensive monthly giving plan and build your program step by step - with a guided companion working alongside you from start to finish. 

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Transcript

What Season Are You In

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Have a question for you that I've kind of been reflecting on. And that is, what season are you in right now? Like, not literally, although Georgia in April is pretty gorgeous. Everything's blooming. Spring is springing, but I mean professionally, like in your fundraising program, specifically in your monthly giving program. Are you in a planting season? Are you like starting something from scratch, trying to figure out where to begin? Are you in a growth season? You have something, it's working, but you know there's a ceiling you haven't broken through yet. Or are you in a season where you're just finding things a little stuck? Like you've got the program, you've got the donors, but the momentum feels slowed and you're not quite sure what to do next. And I'm asking this because I've been in all of these different seasons. And I think many of us are going 100 miles an hour and we almost never really stop to name the season we're in. We're just in it. We're responding, we're executing, we are in our inbox all the time. And this episode I want to bring to you is just about what happens when we stop. When we give ourselves, in this case, what I'm going to be talking about, a Wednesday afternoon to a Friday morning to go as deep as possible on one thing that could change your organization's financial future. And that is the monthly giving retreat. And I just wanted to drop in to tell you about it today because over the weekend I went to Sarum B with my family, went to the farmer's market, and I revisited the portal, which is the mini home that we will be staying in together. And I was like, oh gosh, outside of just like taking the photos and the videos, I was like, I just need, I just wanted to talk to you about it because it's so magical. There's an energy in that space. And here's what I've noticed over the decade plus time of working in this space is that a lot of nonprofit professionals, and actually this is every sector, not just ours, but as we go to professional development events that are sometimes broadly useful. So there are sessions on major gifts, plan giving, annual funds, events,

Why Go Deep On Monthly Giving

SPEAKER_00 2:00

board engagement, like you get a sampling of everything. And I think that's amazing. Do not discount. That is genuinely valuable. But sometimes when you're covering everything, you're not quite covering anything fully. So if you are in a season where you know that monthly giving specifically will be extremely impactful for your organization, picking an event where there's not just inspiration, but there's clarity, there's time to actually build it, to have a whole experience designed around going deep on one thing. So wherever you are in your season, just starting, growing, trying to break break through like a plateau, like what could become possible? And when I designed the monthly giving retreat, I made a very deliberate choice. One, it was, we were obviously going to be talking about monthly giving. Um, but it was also I wanted it to be, I wanted it to feel like you're you're in a living room setting, which we truly are. So it's homes. We're not in hotel rooms, there's no ballrooms. What I loved about photos from last year's retreat, um, this one is May 6th through 8th. Last year's was in August, is the photos of everybody with like no shoes on, having socks, walking around with their snacks, like everyone in the room working on one thing, a monthly leader at different stages on the same journey, conversations that are completely different than you get from everywhere else, because we're having breakfast together, we're grabbing lunch, we're going out to dinner, we're sitting outside, like we're gonna go on hikes here, we can sit by the pool side. They're dive down into the specifics.

The Retreat Experience And Peer Support

SPEAKER_00 3:35

And then when someone shares a challenge with donor retention, then four other people immediately lean in because they're having that challenge too, or someone just cracked something about their monthly giving ass and the whole table is invested, and laptops are being opened and they're walking through how they do something in their tech stack. Like it's extraordinary. There is something that happens when you're in a room with people, an intimate room of people who are equally obsessed with the same thing you are, and you start feeling like you're not alone in what you do. And I do want to talk about Sarinby, where we're hosting the retreat this year. Cause this weekend I went down and I was just like, it's just magical. There's trampolines built into the ground, FYI. There is a cute little park and fire pit right next to where we're staying. The farm to table food that I cannot stop talking about. I had the most delicious pokey bowl when I was there. And the energy is just different. It's designed for your presence. You can't help but slow down when you're there. So I went to go visit the portal and took lots of photos. This is a Scandinavian design building right on a lake that we have rented exclusively for our group. And I was standing there and I was on my phone putting together the intake form because I'm asking everyone in advance like, do you want to go for a hike, hang out by the pool, right? Take a ceramic class, do a sound bath, like all of those we can do. And I want to name why that matters is we spend our days, your days, giving to missions, to donors, to teams, to boards. And we need to give our energy, that energy to ourselves. One of my favorite episodes was when I had my old boss,

Sarinby Setting And Leadership Renewal

SPEAKER_00 5:10

Lisa Bechtold, on the podcast. She was my first boss at the nonprofit I worked at. And it took her like over 20 years to go on a trip like this for herself, to feel refreshed. And I want you to feel the permission and invitation of this moment. And this retreat is designed to give you space to breathe in new ideas, to really let the bigger questions come to the surface. And sometimes, like this experience, yes, it's for you, not only for your organization, not just for your donors and supporters, but for you. So that when you go back, you go back different. In this environment, this retreat shapes the thinking, like full stop. This retreat is luxurious on purpose because the work you're doing, quite frankly and honestly, for your mission deserves that kind of space. And so do you. The rooms are stunning, the home is beautiful, the food's gonna be delicious, we're gonna have good drinks. There is no, like, it's it's gonna be fabulous. The logistics, just picture this with me. You will check in on Wednesday, May 6th at around 4:30 in the afternoon, or whenever you get in if you're taking flights. You will leave Friday, May 8th at around 11 o'clock in the morning. So Wednesday evening, we're gonna have dinner together, lovely dinner outside on the patio, meals, drinks included, programming. Um, and it's all women leaders, whether you're an executive director, development director, communication leads. There are three spots left. Applications close April 10th this week. And just as an example, Kim came to our last year's retreat with 30 monthly donors, roughly. During our time together, we changed her donation tool, created the name, talked about an email strategy to reach her existing base. And a few months later, months, just a couple months, 105 monthly donors. That's more than triple. Lucy attended. She has a about 17,000 people on her email list who had never really been communicated with traditionally, like frequently.

Logistics Spots And Who Attends

SPEAKER_00 7:05

So she connected with one of our guest experts at the retreat, love Jess Campbell, and a relationship started over that experience. And now they're working together on a full email strategy. So hopefully 17,000 people can now hear about their amazing monthly giving program. Kristen came in with essentially very, very little monthly donors, less than 20. She also left with a program name called The Compass, a strategy, clarity to start building. She now has more monthly donors. She's a part of the mini mastermind. She sent one email after that retreat that generated $2,500, like paid for the retreat. And she's coming back this year. And so is Lucy, because she knows what being in this environment is doing for her leadership and her program. So three women from last year's retreat have already RSCP'd to come back. And that to me is the real testament of a review. So I want to be specific because saying that this is a transformational experience can sound vague. But here's the deal: in your form, you are going to outline for us and we work through this together on site. What do you want to leave the retreat with? What is that? And we make sure you do it.

Real Results From Past Attendees

SPEAKER_00 8:10

On the last day in the morning, like we're going around, we're talking about what were your questions? We're making sure that we're getting them answered, we're making sure that you have the resources, accountability partners to make sure that you leave having some work done and the inspiration to keep doing it and the momentum to do it forward. So seasons. Let me go back to this. I think this retreat is really gonna meet you wherever you are. So if you're planting, if you're starting from scratch, if you're not sure where to begin, leave with a foundation, leave it with a name program, a strategy, your first 90 days. If you're growing, you have donors, it's working, but you feel like you've hit that ceiling. Leave knowing exactly where that ceiling is and how to break through it. If you're stuck and you feel like momentum is stalled and something needs to change, but you're not sure what, let's leave with some clarity. Okay, and talking through it and figuring out how to push through that. So we need to come in with for any of this is not a big team or big budget. Many times it's solo EDs running everything by themselves, but just as the commitment to show up fully and to be open to sharing and helping others and guide them and just open to what's possible when you give yourself this kind of time. Three spots, applications close this week. Check in May 6th, leave May 8th in the morning. It's in Sarinby, Georgia. You can look it up. And if this is resonating with you, please don't wait. The link to apply will be in the show notes. If you have questions, come find me on LinkedIn, Dana Snyder, or in our sustainer Slack group on Instagram. You can find me. I want to hear about your program and where you want to take it because truly, like no matter what season you're in, the retreat is designed to move you forward faster than you would get there alone. So I hope to see you at

Outcomes By Season And Next Steps

SPEAKER_00 9:50

Say R because it's just stunning and gonna be so much fun. So if you have any questions, please let me know and have a wonderful rest of your week.