Outsourcing Options and Business Case Creation

Global Animal Welfare Charity

A global animal welfare charity sought guidance on how to reduce the costs of its Donor Relations activities across four continents, whilst maintaining donor relations and process effectiveness. We provided a risk-mitigated, costed roadmap and business case for an outsourcing project which will deliver millions of dollars in saved administration costs over the next few years.

Sector: Third Sector

Location: UK client, global locations

Ownership: Charity

Duration: Short Term

Challenge

The client had a series of small Donor Relations teams in 8 locations across North America, Europe, Africa and Australasia. The teams were small, characterised by varied, low volume activities and expensive to maintain.

Under pressure to reduce administrative expenditure, as part of its 5 Year Strategic Plan, the client sought guidance of the feasibility of outsourcing Donor Relations services. Any cost savings and efficiency gains would need to be balanced by the need to maintain standards of service and relationship management with donors.

Solution

We undertook an analysis of the structure, activities, performance and stakeholder relationships of the various Donor Relations teams to assess whether some or all teams were suitable for partial or full outsourcing.

The scope of the analysis covered: locations; organisational structures, staffing and employment costs; activities and volumes; opening times; tools and systems. This was used to build scenarios for a series of outsourcing options, which explored the linked potential from outsourcing to achieve

  • Lower staff costs

  • Process and technology enhancements

  • Consolidation, in lower cost locations

These were detailed to provide both a range of potential costs savings as well as performance and supplier management considerations and investments to help identify and manage risks.

Outcome

The client was able to present the charity’s board with a series of robust and costed options to outsource some of the internal teams’ services.

In January 2026, with our help and guidance, the charity embarked on a supplier selection exercise to identify the right outsourced provider to deliver quality and process improvements along with significant 6-figure net savings in Year 2 and beyond.