Short version of bio

Alan is the Director of Direct Development with The Gideons International In Canada, where he manages their direct mail, major gifts, planned giving and tribute card programs.

As an author, trainer and speaker, Alan helps directors of development and annual giving officers to craft engaging, warm appeal letters that win the hearts and minds of their donors. Alan’s popular email newsletter about fundraising, “Sharpe Tips,” is read weekly by professional fundraisers worldwide. Alan is also a contributing editor to Canadian FundRaiser.

Alan served as Director of Development and Communications for two international non-profits, where he was responsible for strategic planning, annual direct mail fundraising campaigns, major giving, planned giving, major events, publicity and other enjoyable headaches. He lives in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada.

Long version of bio

Alan is the Director of Direct Development with The Gideons International In Canada, where he manages their direct mail, major gifts, planned giving and tribute card programs.

Alan developed a heart for the neglected and downtrodden while attending St. Lawrence College, a boy’s boarding school in Ramsgate, England. There, his steady diet was biographies of Dr. Bernardo, Elizabeth Fry, David Livingstone and other social reformers who spent themselves serving the less fortunate.

Over the years, Alan taught children with disabilities how to downhill ski, served as a Big Brother and worked at a summer camp for disadvantaged urban youngsters.

In 1997, following a personal crisis at the University of Toronto, where Alan could not find answers to why there was so much suffering and hatred in the world, Alan decided to hitchhike around the world to find answers. He got as far as Alicante, Spain, where he met a Canadian missionary who explained the Christian gospel to him. Through a miraculous turn of events, Alan cut short his travels, returned to Canada, and soon trusted Jesus Christ as his Saviour. Alan is today an evangelical Christian, active as an evangelist and preacher.

Around that time, Alan taught himself the craft of advertising copywriting, and worked as a freelance copywriter as well as a senior copywriter for two advertising agencies. Alan sold everything from pump parts to utility trailers to digital video transmission systems and insurance services, working in every media: print, radio, television, outdoor, multimedia and Internet. He even helped a client use direct mail to sell a coffee table book about Elvis Presley.

After working for a decade as a copywriter, Alan narrowed his focus to two specialties: writing direct mail letters for businesses, and fundraising letters for non-profits.

As an author, trainer and speaker, Alan helps directors of development and annual giving officers to craft engaging, warm appeal letters that win the hearts and minds of their donors. Alan’s popular email newsletter about fundraising, “Sharpe Tips,” is read weekly by professional fundraisers worldwide. Alan is also a contributing editor to Canadian FundRaiser.

Before closing his direct mail consultancy to take his current position with The Gideons, Alan  served as Director of Development and Communications for two international non-profits, where he was responsible for strategic planning, annual direct mail fundraising campaigns, major giving, planned giving, major events, publicity and other enjoyable headaches. Alan is happily married, has two boys, and lives in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada.