By Michael R. Hobbs

It was Christmas in February for Nancy Dawkins.

Dawkins, executive director of the Shepherd's Table Soup Kitchen in Raleigh, had just completed the largest single fundraising drive her group has ever conducted, raising $31,690 in a spur-of-the-moment drive aimed at taking advantage of an offer made by a Rhode Island man who made millions during a career of selling newsletters and collectibles.

"I'm just elated," says Dawkins. "It's the best single thing we've ever done."

Alan Shawn Feinstein, a household name in Rhode Island through his philanthropy, pledged to spend $1 million through his foundation in matching gifts of $25 or more made to soup kitchens and food banks during a 10-day period last month.

Organizations across the country took up the challenge, raising millions of dollars in donations that were still being tallied late last month.

"It's just an overwhelming response," says Steve Landes, a publicist for Feinstein.

Feinstein, 66, closed his newsletter publishing business two years ago to devote himself to philanthropy, he says.

In his home state of Rhode Island, Feinstein's contributions have made him a celebrity. He's often seen on television, making appearances at schools and churches giving away money. Most of the state's public schools have hunger drives affiliated with him. He donated the money to build a high school in Providence called the Feinstein High School for Public Service.

Feinstein estimates he has given more than $50 million to charitable purposes, including the establishment of the Feinstein Foundation.

"I was very fortunate," he says. "But I've always had this feeling that I wanted to do something to try to end hunger."

Feinstein's challenge came at a time of year during which soup kitchens and food banks typically do little fundraising, says Kathy Super, director of development for Second Harvest, a Chicago-based network of U.S. food banks. Almost all of the 185 Second Harvest-affiliated food banks took advantage of Feinstein's challenge, Super said.

"People are talking about it quite a bit," she says. News of the challenge was spread largely by fax machine, with soup kitchens and food banks passing on the Feinstein Foundation news release to others. Newspapers also picked up the story. But some food bank and soup kitchen managers were concerned about the way Feinstein's challenge was structured and chose not to participate.

Feinstein asked that each group requesting a match send copies of the donation checks.

Anne Arella, acting executive director and director of development and public relations at the Food Bank of North Carolina, said she never had seen an appeal like Feinstein's during her 17 years of fundraising.

"I don't think people who send contributions to the Food Bank would be at all pleased if they thought we would make a copy of their check and send it off to get more money," Arella says.

Feinstein made his fortune by using direct mail, which he used to sell newsletters, such as the investment letters The Insider's Report and The Wealth Maker, with subscriber lists that eventually reached 500,000. Feinstein also made money by using ads in his newsletters to sell sets of trading cards produced for his firm.

Direct mail businesses live, and die, by the quality and quantity of the names and addresses used to make their sales appeals. Feinstein says he will never use any of the names gathered through the collection of check copies to make commercial appeals.

"We want copies of the actual checks just to make sure everything is on the up and up," he says. His foundation told soup kitchen managers who called to ask that they could cross out the names and addresses on the check copies. That provision was not included in the foundation's press releases.

Feinstein says he will not give the names to anyone else. He did not rule out using the names to make future fundraising appeals.

"I have no particular plans to use them," he says. "Depending on the amount that comes in I might like to send them a letter to thank them and encourage them in philanthropy in the future."

Arella, of the N.C. Food Bank, says she also was concerned that any match her group received may not be worth the effort, given that so many groups were taking advantage of the offer.

"One million dollars divided up by all the agencies in the country that feed the hungry? What does that mean as far as what you actually receive?" she asks.

"A million dollars is a lot of money to give away," Arella says. "I think it's a wonderful idea, but perhaps the benefit would be greater on a smaller scale so that more people could be served."

To gauge the magnitude of Feinstein's $1 million offer, look at a similar matching gift program he ran in November in Rhode Island. He offered to spend up to $100,000 matching donations made to soup kitchens there. The drive raised $1.3 million, meaning Feinstein's matching contributions amounted to 7.7 cents for every dollar raised by the soup kitchens. Even so, Feinstein's challenge was very important to groups trying to feed the hungry, Second Harvest's Super says. "If those food banks and pantries and kitchens get so much money he can give only a dollar to each one, I think it's still worth the effort," she says. "It gets people talking about hunger and getting people to act. Why we do matching programs is to get our donors to do something. Oftentimes we end up raising far more money than what the challenger has provided, but I think the whole reason to do it is to raise awareness."

Michael R. Hobbs can be reached at
mrhobbs@mindspring.com