A donor gives $2,500 in two gifts over the spring. By your board’s definition, that puts her in the Director’s Circle: invitations to the preview reception, her name on the donor wall, maybe free parking. The question is how Altru knows that. Altru’s membership model is built around dues. Someone buys a level at a set price, and the term starts. Giving circles work the other way around: the gift comes first, and the level is earned from cumulative giving.
That mismatch is the whole problem. Below are the three setups we see work in Altru, what each one costs you in staff time, and how to pick between them.
Start by defining the circle on paper
Before touching configuration, answer these questions with your development lead. Each answer pushes you toward a different setup.
- What counts toward the threshold? Only outright donations, or also membership dues, event tickets, sponsorships, and pledge payments? Soft credits from a spouse or a donor-advised fund?
- Over what period? Calendar year, fiscal year, or a rolling 12 months from the qualifying gift?
- Who is recognized? The individual, or the household?
- What do circle members actually receive? Admission benefits that need to scan at the gate are very different from a name in the annual report.
- How is the gift split for tax receipts? If circle benefits have real fair market value, the acknowledgment has to show the deductible portion. Talk to your finance team or auditor before you launch, not after.
Option 1: Price the circle as a membership level
The simplest route is to make the circle a level (or a separate program) in Altru memberships, priced at the threshold. A $1,000 “Patron Circle” level is sold the same way as a $90 family level. Benefits, cards, expiration dates, and renewals all work the way your staff already know.
Good fit when: donors typically give one gift at or above the threshold, and circle benefits include admission or anything else you scan or check at the door.
Watch out for:
- It doesn’t handle cumulative giving. Two $600 gifts won’t add up to a $1,000 level on their own.
- The full payment lands as membership revenue unless you split it. Many organizations record the fair market value of benefits as membership and the remainder as a donation, which means building that split into how the transaction is processed and how revenue is designated. Test this carefully, because the split also affects what prints on the acknowledgment.
- Upgrades mid-term (a member at $250 gives another $800) need a clear rule about whether the term restarts.
Option 2: Track the circle with a constituent attribute
Here, gifts are entered as normal donations, and circle status lives on the constituent record as an attribute or constituency, something like “Giving Circle: Director’s, FY27.” A saved query totals each constituent’s qualifying revenue for the period and lists anyone at or above each threshold who doesn’t yet have the matching attribute. Someone on the development team reviews that list on a set schedule and updates the records.
Good fit when: giving is spread across several gifts, recognition is mostly about lists, events, and stewardship rather than gate access, and you want the revenue to stay cleanly coded as contributions.
Watch out for:
- It’s manual. If nobody runs the query, status drifts. Put it on someone’s monthly calendar and name a backup.
- Attributes don’t expire on their own. Put the fiscal year in the attribute’s value (and use its date fields too, if your attribute category has them) so last year’s circle doesn’t quietly carry forward.
- Admission benefits won’t come along automatically. If circle members get free entry, front-line staff need a way to see the attribute, or you’ll also need Option 3.
Smart fields that sum giving over a date range can make the query faster and easier to reuse in reports. Build and test them in a sandbox first. Recalculating smart fields on a large database takes time, and you want the logic right before it shows up in board reports.
Option 3: Combine them
Many organizations end up with a hybrid. Gifts are recorded as donations, the attribute query identifies who qualified, and staff then issue a complimentary membership at the circle level so benefits, cards, and scanning work like any other membership. The comp membership carries no revenue, so contributions stay contributions.
This is the most work to keep up, but it’s the only version that handles cumulative giving and gives circle members a card that works at the gate. If you go this way, write the steps down: which query, which comp level, what term length, and who approves edge cases like pledges that aren’t fully paid.
What about native recognition features?
Some Blackbaud products include recognition programs that assign levels automatically from cumulative giving. Whether your Altru database has an equivalent, and how far it goes, depends on your configuration and licensing. We’d rather not guess. Ask Blackbaud support directly, or look through the revenue and constituent configuration areas in a sandbox. If an automated option is available to you, test it against a handful of real donors with messy histories (split gifts, soft credits, refunds) before you rely on it.
Choosing quickly
- Most circle donors give one gift at the level, and benefits include admission: Option 1.
- Giving is cumulative and recognition is mostly stewardship: Option 2.
- Giving is cumulative and circle members expect a working membership card: Option 3.
Whichever you choose, run it for one full cycle with a small group before announcing the program publicly. Compare your query results against what the development team believes the circle roster should be. The differences tell you which gifts or soft credits your rules missed.
Quick answers
Should household members share circle status?
Decide once and apply it consistently. If you recognize households, total giving at the household level in your query. Otherwise a couple who splits gifts between two records can fall short of a threshold they actually met.
Do pledges count toward the threshold?
That’s a policy call. Counting only paid amounts is simpler and avoids recognizing donors who never complete the pledge. If you count pledges, exclude written-off balances from the query.
