Customer story: Birmingham Dogs Home

The wrong fit was holding them back

For over 130 years, Birmingham Dogs Home has been a lifeline for abandoned and stray dogs across the West Midlands. Rescuing, rehabilitating and rehoming over 2,000 dogs annually, the charity operates at near-capacity most days, with 70% of their dogs arriving completely homeless from the streets.

The reality is stark: it costs £6,000 per day, £4.2 million annually, just to keep the doors open. With zero government funding, every penny must be raised through supporter donations.

Before Donorfy, their five-strong fundraising team faced a common challenge: using a system not tailored for their needs. They were using an overarching database that was amazing at holding doggy data and rehoming information, but they were squeezing in donor and supporter data that didn't naturally fit.

Finding the pawfect match

After exploring various options, Donorfy stood out as the most comprehensive choice, offering all the features and functionality they needed to move forward.

Why Birmingham Dogs Home chose Donorfy:

• Built by fundraisers, for fundraisers - "It's obviously been developed by people who know fundraising, rather than just being a CRM with some bits for fundraising in there"
• Transparent pricing - Simple pricing model with no upfront licence fee
• Powerful integrations - "The techy people were really impressed with how the Donorfy API works"
• Expert implementation support - Working with MAST made the transition smooth and stress-free

A smooth transition

With no internal IT department or resource, how their new CRM would be implemented was on their minds. The team worked with MAST, who handled everything from setup to data input, ensuring a smooth transition and making the process less daunting.

"It was a big change for some of the team, who had been using the other system for a long time," explains Rachel. "There was some resistance initially to the idea of moving away. The methodical approach to implementation meant we managed to find better and easier ways of doing things and it helped the change."

The result? The transition was completed on time and within budget, ensuring they could hit the ground running with less stress.

From zero to 100 in functionality

"You name any aspect of fundraising, and there's been a huge improvement in each one. Things that weren't possible with the limited system we had before are possible now. We've gone from zero to 100 in terms of functionality."

- Natalie Pursall, Individual Giving Officer

The transformation was immediate and dramatic. The five-strong team are pretty reliant on Donorfy now, using it in lots of different ways - managing tasks, setting up opportunities, segmenting supporters and monthly management reporting.

The Donorfy features Birmingham Dogs Home loves

Smart list building and segmentation "I'm always on lists. Lists are great for bigger projects and for setting up campaigns as well as day to day tasks such as monthly reporting.”

Auto-tagging for donor intelligence "When we get a donation now, we can look on Donorfy to see, 'Oh, this person donates annually at this time of year,' so you can personalise your response.

GDPR-compliant communications "It’s easy to identify who we can mail, who we can't mail."

Seamless integrations connected with website forms, JustGiving, Facebook and Mailchimp to create a unified fundraising ecosystem.

Making data work for them

The team can now make data-driven decisions instead of taking their best guess for success. Easily segmenting their supporters, creating lists, allocating tags and tracking activities and campaigns have changed the game.

Time savings that matter: "If we wanted to produce a report about a particular type of supporter, that might have taken weeks of manual labour to craft before. Whereas now, we can set something up in a few minutes. There's no comparison, really."

Targeted Christmas Appeals: Managing their Christmas Appeal is more intuitive too. Supporters donate to help fill the dishes of the 300 dogs in their care or sponsor kennels, and they use Donorfy to put together the data they need.

This enables them to target communications to different types of supporter, be it someone who has adopted a dog in the last 12 months, or someone who's donated £50 or more. "Whatever segment we choose, we can create the data and send an appropriate mailing, including targeted newsletters. That wasn't happening at all before."

An award-winning campaign powered by data

In 2025, Natalie put Donorfy to the test with an ambitious 'Sponsor a Kennel' campaign. The campaign needed to attract new regular givers to help fund the £6,000 daily running costs.

Finding the perfect story

The campaign centred around Gummy Bear, a Cane Corso who arrived at the shelter completely blind and deaf, found wandering the streets alone.

"We don't get many blind and deaf dogs in.” Natalie explained.

His story stuck with Natalie and she thought it would stick with their supporters as well. "Because his had a happy ending, that was really what I wanted to get through with the campaign, I wanted to give supporters the chance to give other dogs their own happy ending as well."

The happy ending: Gummy Bear now lives on a canal boat with two elderly dogs and owners who specialise in caring for blind dogs. "I think because he's so unique, this is just perfect for him," Natalie smiled.

Targeting the right supporters

Using Donorfy's segmentation tools, Natalie identified supporters who hadn't given regularly via direct debit but showed engagement through one-off donations.

The campaign was deployed rapidly. "The Gummy Bear campaign was pulled together pretty quickly, we had the story, it was ready to go within a day.”

Donorfy's online forms allowed supporters to choose which kennel they wanted to sponsor (from ten options) and select items for their welcome pack, making the sign-up process seamless.

Results that exceeded expectations

The campaign was a success:

• 31 new kennel sponsors secured in August-September 2025
• Doubled the results from 15 sponsors in the same period in 2024
• Additional one-off donations from supporters who wanted to help but couldn't commit to regular giving
• Highly commended recognition in the Access Impact Awards, validating their data-driven approach

Perhaps most importantly, the real-time reporting meant they could monitor and optimise as they went. "If something's not working, you can quickly tweak it and change it rather than waiting for the full campaign to roll out," notes Natalie.

A fundraising transformation

For Natalie, who joined Birmingham Dogs Home from a marketing background with no charity sector experience, Donorfy was transformational.

"I think for me it's a little bit of a one-stop shop for everything. Donorfy has given me so much access to our data in a really manageable way."

- Natalie Pursall, Individual Giving Officer

The platform is essential to her daily work. "I use it every day to manage our data and it makes life a lot, lot easier."

When asked how she'd describe Donorfy to another charity, Natalie is clear:

"I don't actually know how I'd do my job without Donorfy”

- Natalie Pursall, Individual Giving Officer

Worth the investment

"Yes, Donorfy comes at an expense, but the time it saves, the money it saves, is really important. It opens you up to be able to do much better and more strategic campaigns and therefore bring in more funds."

The stakes couldn't be higher. Every campaign, every pound raised, directly translates to dogs getting the second chance they deserve:

• Truman – a Lurcher found emaciated and tied to a bus stop by a washing line
• Ruben - an 11-year-old King Charles Spaniel found matted and defeated in a park
• Gummy Bear - a blind and deaf Cane Corso now happily living on a canal boat

"I'm very happy to recommend Donorfy. Fundraising is challenging and you need the right tools to stand a chance of real success."

- Natalie Pursall, Individual Giving Officer

In summary, Birmingham Dogs Home's use of Donorfy brought about a pivotal shift in their fundraising journey. As our aim is to give charities more time, better tools and the freedom to do more of what truly matters, we couldn't be more thrilled—and can't wait to see what they do next.

Donorfy is a comprehensive CRM solution designed specifically for charities and not-for-profit organisations. The platform helps fundraising teams manage supporter relationships, create targeted campaigns, track donations and measure impact—all while ensuring GDPR compliance and data security.