Cathedral Letter Concepts to Focus on Serving the Diocesan, Church, Nonprofit Markets
Cathedral Letter Concepts to Focus on Serving the Diocesan, Church, Nonprofit Markets
Rome, NY – Marianne W. Gaige, Cathedral Corporation’s Chairman and CEO, has announced that Cathedral’s Diocesan, Church and Nonprofit Division, including its headquarters and production facility in Rome, New York, and Letter Concepts facility in Berlin, Connecticut, will now be known as Cathedral Letter Concepts.
The organization will continue to serve its nearly 4,000 customers, including more than 40 dioceses, archdioceses and religious orders, more than 3,800 churches of all denominations and a range of nonprofits including higher education institutions, police benefit organizations and social ministries. “We remain committed to serve our foundational diocesan, church and nonprofit customers with print, mail and a range of electronic products and services,” Gaige emphasized.
“Our commitment to serving the Church with cost-efficient, practical solutions as well as excellence in data management, print production and mailing is the foundation of everything we do, and that will continue as we move into a new era with Cathedral Letter Concepts,” said Thomas M. Wilson, Executive Vice President and General Manager.
Cathedral Corporation began in 1916 as a manufacturer of corrugated boxes. Over time, management saw the need to diversify the business, acquiring a company that produced offering envelopes, managed parishioner lists and mailed these offering envelopes directly to parishioners’ homes. Eventually, the paper-board part of the business was sold, and the print and mail business became the strategic focus of the company, which expanded to offer data management services and other kinds of direct mail.
For example, a church mailing of offering envelopes commonly went to only a partial list of parishioners. A personalized direct mail letter to the remainder allowed the church to stay in touch with all parishioners. This strategy helps the church become more financially fit by providing other ways to receive offerings and, just as important, to stay in touch with all parishioners and increase parishioner involvement in the church. This stewardship direct mail program for churches became a proven and effective approach.
As a natural evolution of managing customer data and focusing on member-type groups, Cathedral Corporation started to diversify into other industry segments while still focusing on core competencies including personalized direct mail programs, high-quality production control and exceptional customer service. In so doing, Cathedral acquired companies in Lincoln, Rhode Island, in 1995; Rome, New York, in 1999 and in Orlando, Florida, in 2014, with facilities tailored to produce business communications for member-based organizations such as banks, credit unions, insurance companies, government agencies, healthcare and tolling services.
And in 2021, eager to grow its market share in the church space, Cathedral had acquired Letter Concepts, a Berlin, Connecticut, firm that specialized in personalized direct mail fundraising to Catholic dioceses, archdioceses and parishes nationwide. Co-founded in 1989 by brothers John & Tom Wilson, the firm emphasized cost-effective, error-free production in serving some of the largest dioceses and archdioceses in the country with (arch)bishop’s appeals, capital campaigns and special collections.
With the addition of the Letter Concepts team, Cathedral grew to more than 280 employees at four locations including its Rome headquarters and plants in Rhode Island, Florida and Connecticut. The acquisition of Letter Concepts by Cathedral enabled the corporation to provide all clients with a wider range of communication channel opportunities including:
- Database creation by the LC programming department, including housing and updating of client databases.
- Personalized, targeted and segmented direct mail, lockbox and data processing services including data entry, check depositing and credit card entry of all campaign returns, including supplying import files to be uploaded daily into each client’s CRM software.
- Robust email communications and follow-ups, social media advertising to enhance program results, tracking of mailings to see actual in-home delivery dates, and a thorough analysis of mailing results to allow adjustments during the campaign.
The Cathedral Business Division was acquired in June 2025 by FSSI, a leading California-based provider of print, mail and electronic document outsourcing services. This strategic move allowed change to Cathedral Letter Concepts, still headquartered in Rome, with a concentrated focus on church and nonprofit service. Cathedral Letter Concepts’ strategy remains focused on managing customer data to produce customized direct marketing programs, delivering appeals and campaigns as well as envelope and electronic services, and featuring high-quality production control and exceptional customer service.
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