Donors don't lapse because the cause stopped mattering. They lapse because nothing after the gift made the gift feel noticed. Scribble sends a handwritten letter at every moment that keeps a donor attached — triggered automatically from the donor system you already run.
Scribble is an automated handwritten letter service for nonprofits professionals. It sends real ink-on-paper notes triggered by CRM events — the first gift, a major or milestone gift, the giving anniversary — personalized from your data and mailed in 3–5 business days. No manual writing, no envelope stuffing.
“Most nonprofits lose the majority of their first-time donors within a year, and acquiring a replacement costs several times what keeping the original would have. The lever that moves retention hardest isn't a better appeal — it's gratitude that lands as real. Your donors are already buried in appeal email, including yours. A handwritten envelope with no ask inside is rare enough to reframe the whole relationship, and the development shops sending them are the ones with second gifts on the board.”
Scribble fires a personalized handwritten letter at each of these automatically.
The most important window in a donor's lifetime, and the one most often spent on an automated receipt. A prompt handwritten thank-you — specific about the cause, with no ask attached — is the strongest single predictor that a first-time donor gives again.
A large gift, or a donor crossing a cumulative giving threshold, deserves more than a bigger receipt. A note from someone senior naming what the gift makes possible is what turns a major donor into a lasting one.
A letter marking a year — or five — of support, with nothing asked for, tells a donor you see them as a partner rather than a line item. It is the touch that makes the next appeal welcome.
Someone who gave last year and not this one is far cheaper to win back than a new donor is to find. A warm, guilt-free note reopens a door that another appeal email keeps closing.
The people who give time, and the ones quietly giving every month, are your most committed supporters and your most overlooked. A written thank-you costs almost nothing and is where word-of-mouth and legacy giving start.
Development teams using Scribble see more first-time donors converting to second gifts, lapsed supporters returning without another appeal, and major donors who answer the phone — without adding a task to a staff that is already stretched across the campaign calendar.
See it in action →Link your CRM or ATS. Scribble watches for the trigger events you define — a deal closing, a stage change, a referral tag.
We draft a warm, specific note using the real context from your data: names, details, what actually happened.
We handwrite it in real ink, stuff the envelope, stamp it and mail it. Your client holds it in 3–5 business days.
Scribble connects through webhooks and Zapier and integrates natively with HubSpot, which covers most donor platforms in use — including Bloomerang, DonorPerfect, Little Green Light, Neon and Kindful. If your system can fire an event when a gift is recorded, a donor crosses a giving threshold, or a supporter passes a lapse window, Scribble can listen for it and mail a letter. Book a demo and we'll map your specific triggers.
Yes. Scribble supports multiple sender names and handwriting styles, so a major-gift letter can come from the executive director while first-gift letters come from the development coordinator. The donor sees the name of a person they can picture, which is most of why the channel works.
Treat them as separate things. Your donor platform should keep issuing the receipt with the substantiation language your accountant requires; the Scribble letter is the human half that receipts are bad at. Sending both is the point — the receipt satisfies the IRS, the letter keeps the donor.
No, and this is the mistake that ruins the channel. A letter that only thanks is what makes the next ask welcome; a thank-you with a reply envelope in it reads as a solicitation and undoes the goodwill you just bought. Keep the gratitude clean and let the appeal calendar do its own work.
Run it against retention rather than against postage. Replacing a lapsed donor costs several times what keeping one does, so a program that converts even a modest share of first-time donors into second gifts pays for itself inside a fiscal year. Most organizations start with first-gift and lapsed triggers only, which keeps volume predictable. Book a demo for pricing at your gift volume.
It tracks gift volume rather than organization size. A small shop running first-gift and lapsed-donor triggers usually sends 40–150 letters a month, with a spike around year-end and after any campaign. Larger development teams running milestone and anniversary triggers as well send considerably more.
No pressure. No pitch deck. Just a conversation about what you need.
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