Director of Development and Communications

Director of Development and Communications

Location: Quest Outreach Society, 2020 Dundas Street, Vancouver (In-Person)

Term: Full-time, Permanent

Compensation: $80,000 - $90,000 annually

Start Date: September 1, 2026

The Opportunity

About Quest

Quest Outreach Society exists to disrupt cycles of food insecurity through access to healthy and affordable food. By bridging the gap between food banks and traditional grocery stores, Quest provides a nonprofit grocery market experience grounded in dignity, access, affordability, and sustainability. Quest works with food partners, donors, volunteers, referring agencies, and community supporters to redirect good food that might otherwise go to waste and make it available to individuals and families facing food insecurity across Metro Vancouver.

Position Summary

Quest is seeking a resourceful, relationship-centred, and highly organized Director of Development and Communications to join the organization’s Senior Leadership Team.

Reporting to the Executive Director, this role leads Quest’s fundraising, donor relations, grants, corporate sponsorships, campaign development, public communications, and related community engagement. The position is fundraising-first, with communications serving as a key tool for donor engagement, public awareness, campaign success, and organizational credibility.

This is a broad and hands-on leadership role suited to someone who can move comfortably between strategy and execution. The successful candidate will help build Quest’s fund development program while also managing the practical details required to keep campaigns, donor relationships, grant applications, communications, and reporting moving forward.

A key priority will be to help grow Quest’s annual revenue from donations and grants while initiating a special campaign to support capital replacement and renewal needs, including leasehold improvements and equipment for new market locations.

Key Responsibilities

Fund Development and Donor Relations

• Develop and implement a fund development strategy aligned with Quest’s mission, operating needs, and financial sustainability goals.
• Help grow annual revenue from donations, grants, corporate sponsorships, and other contributed sources by approximately 25%.
• Build and maintain relationships with individual donors, major gift prospects, foundations, service clubs, faith communities, corporations, and other community supporters.
• Prepare donor correspondence, thank-you letters, proposals, impact updates, briefing notes, meeting materials, and recognition materials.
• Support the Executive Director and board members in donor cultivation, solicitation, stewardship, and relationship management.
• Identify opportunities to deepen relationships with food partners, corporate volunteer groups, and other operational partners who may also have capacity to support Quest financially.

Grants, Campaigns, and Special Initiatives

• Own and manage Quest’s grants program, including research, applications, submissions, reporting, stewardship, and deadline tracking.
• Write and coordinate grant applications, letters of inquiry, proposals, reports, budgets, evaluation summaries, and supporting materials.
• Plan and execute fundraising campaigns, including annual appeals, seasonal campaigns, Giving Tuesday, email campaigns, direct mail campaigns, donor updates, and community giving initiatives.
• Coordinate campaign details, including timelines, mailing lists, donor segmentation, materials, content, approvals, data entry, tracking, acknowledgement, and follow-up.
• Initiate and support a special capital renewal campaign of up to $1.5 million for new market locations, leasehold improvements, equipment, and related infrastructure needs.
• Create sponsorship proposals, partnership packages, recognition plans, and tailored materials for corporate and community supporters.

Communications and Public Relations

• Lead Quest’s external communications in support of fundraising, donor engagement, public awareness, and community trust.
• Develop key messages that clearly explain Quest’s mission, nonprofit grocery market model, food recovery work, community impact, and funding needs.
• Write and coordinate newsletters, donor updates, campaign copy, website content, social media content, media releases, annual report content, sponsorship materials, and other public-facing communications.
• Ensure Quest’s communications are clear, consistent, respectful, strengths-based, and aligned with the organization’s values.
• Support the Executive Director with media relations, speaking notes, public presentations, backgrounders, and responses to public inquiries.
• Guide digital communications strategy while ensuring digital activity supports fundraising, public awareness, and community engagement goals.

Donor Systems, Data, and Administration

• Lead the transition toward stronger donor systems, including the anticipated implementation and use of DonorPerfect integrated with Constant Contact.
• Help move Quest from spreadsheet-based donor tracking toward more reliable donor records, campaign lists, reporting processes, and stewardship systems.
• Maintain accurate donor, funder, sponsor, and partner records, including contact information, giving history, communications history, pledges, grant deadlines, reporting requirements, and follow-up tasks.
• Work with finance staff to support accurate gift processing, charitable receipting, reconciliation, donor acknowledgement, and reporting.
• Prepare reports on fundraising activity, revenue progress, campaign outcomes, donor retention, grant submissions, sponsorships, and communications activity.
• Create templates, processes, calendars, checklists, and tracking systems that make Quest’s fund development and communications work more consistent and sustainable.

Board and Senior Leadership Support

• Participate as a member of Quest’s Senior Leadership Team and contribute to organization-wide planning, decision-making, and problem-solving.
• Support the Executive Director in engaging the Board of Directors around fundraising priorities, donor cultivation, campaign planning, and community relationship development.
• Prepare board-level updates, briefing notes, campaign materials, donor information, and reports as required.
• Support board members and volunteers to participate effectively in specific fundraising or relationship-building initiatives.

Qualifications and Experience

• The ideal candidate will bring a strong combination of fundraising experience, communications skill, relationship-building ability, and practical administrative discipline.

Required or strongly preferred qualifications include:

• Several years of experience in fund development, donor relations, grant writing, nonprofit communications, sponsorship development, public relations, or a related field.
• Demonstrated experience developing fundraising campaigns, donor stewardship activities, grant applications, sponsorship proposals, or community giving initiatives.
• Strong writing skills, with the ability to prepare compelling donor communications, grant proposals, campaign materials, newsletters, reports, and public-facing content.
• Experience managing donor, funder, sponsor, or community partner relationships.
• Strong project management skills, including the ability to manage multiple priorities, deadlines, campaigns, and relationships at the same time.
• Experience with donor databases, CRM systems, email marketing platforms, or a demonstrated ability to learn and implement new systems.
• Strong attention to detail and comfort with administrative work, data tracking, list management, reporting, and follow-up.
• Ability to work independently in a hands-on role with limited administrative support.
• Ability to work collaboratively with senior leadership, finance, operations, market staff, warehouse staff, volunteers, board members, donors, and external partners.
• Commitment to Quest’s mission and to communicating about poverty, food insecurity, and community need in ways that are respectful, non-stigmatizing, and grounded in dignity.

Other assets may include:

• Experience with DonorPerfect and Constant Contact, or similar donor CRMs and email marketing platforms.
• Experience leading or supporting a capital campaign, special campaign, major gift initiative, or infrastructure-related fundraising effort.
• Experience working in food security, poverty reduction, nonprofit retail, social services, environmental sustainability, or community development.
• Familiarity with CRA charitable receipting rules, donor privacy expectations, and ethical fundraising practices.
• Experience preparing annual reports, impact reports, sponsorship decks, board reports, or campaign cases for support.

Skills and Attributes

The successful candidate will be:

• A strong relationship-builder who enjoys connecting with donors, funders, sponsors, volunteers, board members, and community partners.
• A clear and persuasive writer who can translate Quest’s work into compelling, respectful, and mission-aligned communications.
• A practical strategist who can build plans, set priorities, and follow through on implementation.
• A self-starter who can create structure where systems are still developing.
• Highly organized, detail-oriented, and reliable with deadlines.
• Comfortable working in a busy nonprofit environment where priorities can shift and resources are limited.
• Able to balance external relationship-building with internal administration and followthrough.
• Thoughtful about language, dignity, equity, poverty, inclusion, and the lived realities of the people Quest serves.
• Collaborative, resilient, flexible, and committed to contributing to a strong team culture.

Reporting Relationship

The Director of Development and Communications reports to the Executive Director and serves as a member of Quest’s Senior Leadership Team. The role works closely with finance, operations, market, warehouse, volunteer, and administrative staff, and may support the Board of Directors or board committees on specific fundraising and communications initiatives.

Compensation & Commitment

This is a full-time, permanent position with a starting salary of $80,000 to $90,000 plus a comprehensive extended health benefits plan. This role is based at Quest’s East Vancouver head office, with regular engagement across Quest’s markets, warehouse, donor, partner, and community environments. Some evening or weekend work may be required occasionally for events, donor meetings, campaigns, or community engagement activities. Local travel within Metro Vancouver may be required.

Proposed Start Date: September 1, 2026 (or as soon as possible)

How To Apply

Send your résumé and cover letter in a single PDF attachment to Quest’s Manager, People & Culture, Diana Pemberton at hr@questoutreach.org. Please use the email subject "Quest Director of Development and Communications" and include your name in the title of the PDF.

We recognize the importance of a diverse workforce and encourage applications from Indigenous people, women, LGBTQIA+ people, people of colour, people with disabilities, and people who identify as neurodiverse.

If there are accommodations we can provide to make our hiring process more accessible for you, or if you have suggestions for improving our hiring process, please reach out to us directly.

Application Deadline: August 12, 2026

Please apply early – qualified candidates who submit their application ahead of the deadline may be contacted sooner for an initial interview.

Thank you for your interest in working with Quest!