Although the economy has been rough over the past few years, it has resulted in a lot of positive change in the way our ministry uses its resources. In a process similar to what many of you are probably going through, we’ve been combing through our budgets to find creative ways to stretch our dollars and be better stewards with what God has provided for us.
Throughout this process, it has been a blast to get input from other ministry leaders and pass around some good ideas. With that in mind, I thought it would be fun to start an open thread to hear the money-saving strategies your ministry has put into practice. I think we can all learn a thing or two from each other, and hopefully focus more of our financial resources on sharing the Good News.
I’ll get us started: We’re replacing our Exchange-based email/calendar server with the Google Apps Suite (free to non-profits!). Not only is it saving us money, but it’s actually moving us to a superior platform in light of the way our staff communicates.
Your turn!
1) Switched to VoIP phones over DSL lines. Dropped cost of T-1 and dedicated lines Savings: $400 month
2) Switched webhosting to piggyback on that of a church members. Savings $25/month
3) Changed Credit Card processors. Savings $150/month.
4) Church member built our new blog using Wordpress instead of outsourcing it. Savings: $2000.
5) Redesigned church bulletin to be printed in-house on color laser. Savings: $100/month.
Something else I forgot to mention: We’re making an effort to give our members many more opportunities to serve and volunteer in areas like landscaping, cleaning, etc.
Besides freeing up financial resources for more ministry-related efforts, it gives a lot of folks a different way to serve and “be needed” that wasn’t available before. It’s going great so far, and it’s very cool to see the heart of our people displayed in such activities.
We save thousands of dollars annually by using coupon codes as often as we can for purchases (mostly online printers). Find them at retailmenot.com
We were already printing our bulletin in house but by switching to a standard paper size, and making our worship guide a half sheet instead of a full folded sheet, we are saving something like $6k a year in paper and printing costs.
Also, if you find yourself needing shared hosting for something, dreamhost.com offers it for free to non-profits.
We started printing our weekend program in black on a neutral tone paper and eliminated all color printing on it; a savings of well over $6500 a year.
I’m curious how the calendar thing is going. We are looking for a new calendar to replace the ACS Ministry Scheduler. It would primarily be used for scheduling events in rooms, though in theory would be nice to have separate calendars for custodial use and youth and family area use. We have 30 rooms we regularly schedule. In your opinion, could the google calendar handle that? Any other suggestions?