Fundraising for an event or activity can be frustrating. It seems that everyone is trying to raise funds; schools, churches, scouts, and sports teams. Most resort to the traditional cookie, candy, or catalogue sales methods. Because these methods are over used, their effectiveness is questionable. Creative fundraising is the key to raising the needed funds. An important fundraising rule: Your target audience for fundraising desires value for their donation. Guilt may never be enough motivation to encourage someone to purchase an overpriced candy bar, or a bad car wash . If those participating believe they are getting something in return of value, they will continue to support your group.
Here are some of the fundraising ideas that we have discovered are most effective:
1) Golf Tournament –
A great warm-weather fundraising event is a golf fundraiser. Hosting your own golf tournament is actually fairly easy and if done right, you can raise a significant amount of money. Here are some tips for maximizing your results.
Big turnout - Obviously, the bigger the crowd, the better you'll do with your tournament. Promote with quality posters at golf stores, your own offices, and other high-traffic, high-visibility locations. Use your newsletter and email lists as additional ways to get the word out.
Distribute a press release about your golf fundraiser to all your local media outlets. Describe your most noteworthy news angle in the summary paragraph and then get into the who, what, when, where, why, and how aspects of your golf outing.
Greens fee markup - Most golf courses will give you a substantial discount for a large group, particularly if you're scheduled for a weekday when traffic is low. You can charge the regular price and do quite well. Or, you can pocket the discount, markup the regular greens fee by $10, and do even better.
Hole sponsors - Contact local businesses and ask them to sponsor a hole. To attract eighteen sponsors, make it affordable, say $100 or so. Show them a mockup of the signs that will be placed for each sponsor and your event program where you'll list all your sponsors.
Corporate sponsors - For the biggest financial impact, approach large corporations and ask them to sponsor your event. Companies with headquarters or substantial operations in your area are your best bets. Price your corporate sponsorships at a reasonable level, say $1,000 for a smaller golf tournament, and you'll get a good response.
Put together a sponsorship request on your letterhead and be specific as to what's in it for the corporation, i.e. prominent signage at the event, corporate logo golf balls for all golfers, newspaper coverage, golfing slots for top executives, etc.
Ask around within your group to see if anyone has personal contacts at the management level. Managers often have discretionary funds available for reasonable promotional expenditures.
Player sponsors - Just like individuals get sponsors for Relay For Life walks, Multiple Sclerosis bike rides, and other types of event fundraisers, so should your players. Put together a sponsorship form and ask each player to raise at least $100 in pledges along with their greens fees.
Silent auction - Solicit items from local businesses and even offer to pay for some popular items that will attract serious bidding such as golf lessons from the club pro or a set of new irons.
On the day of your golf fundraiser, setup a couple of tables full of donated goods and services. Tape bidding sheets and descriptions of each item to the tables so that golfers can place bids one-handed.
Make sure to get the bidding started on each item and encourage everyone to bid. Do a last call for bids as everyone is gathering for the awards ceremony that wraps up your tournament, then announce the winners, collect the funds, and disperse the merchandise.
Hold a raffle - You can sell raffle tickets for quality prizes in conjunction with your event. They don't even have to be golf related, but it does help to have at least some prizes such as a new golf bag, free round, season pass to top course, etc.
Price your tickets so that you raise at least twice as much as your prizes cost. If your prize costs total $5,000, then sell 1,000 tickets for $10 each. You can make even more if you get prizes donated.
To increase sales, sell tickets to the general public and not just to your group of supporters. You can even set up a sales table at high-traffic locations like shopping centers. obviously, follow all local regulations concerning raffle ticket sales.
Cash bar cart - Load up the back of a golf cart with ice and cold drinks, then drive the course and sell your golfers what they want. Cold beer and sodas are the best sellers, but don't forget to include snack foods like pretzels and chips.
Catered lunch - Work with the club to offer a catered lunch to all your golfers or at least a boxed lunch of sandwich, chips, and a cookie. Depending on what you're offering, markup your costs by $2 to $4 per person and you'll do well. overcharging will actually cut into your total profits.
2) Crab Feed –
We have made lots of money using this fundraising. It is very simple, and people will pay more money for an event like this since it is unlike anything else anywhere else.
Here are a couple of links to organizations who have done Crab feeds – they can get you info on where to get product, and details on making this work for you
http://www.sr-rotary-west.org/
http://www.eventbrite.com/event/88565903
3) Pink Flamingoes –
A pink flamingo fundraiser is fun way to raise money for your favorite cause. It's an easy fundraiser for any size group to put together because it requires very little effort to keep it going.
The basic fundraising idea involves deploying a flock of pink plastic flamingoes in someone's yard or outside a business entrance. A note is left explaining that the person or business has been selected by someone to be "flocked" for a good cause. And, it then goes on to explain that they will have to pay $10 per flamingo to have them relocated.
The fun part is that each flocking victim then gets to pick the next victim. The flocking process continues for the duration of the fundraising event.
Of course, you will always run into a few killjoys who don't see either the humor or the good cause behind the flocking. When that happens, you just remove the birds, have the previous recipient select a new victim and get things going all over again.
Getting started - There is a small upfront investment in the flamingoes, but you quickly recoup that cost with a couple of flockings. It makes sense to have multiple flocks working at the same time, so purchase five dozen or so.
Write up your fundraising manifesto and place copies in a large plastic Ziplock bag attached to the foot of each flock's leader. That way your fundraising information and the previous victim's note will stay protected from the elements.
Publicity tips - Newspapers, radio and television stations are always looking for a humorous story, particularly one that's for a good cause. Put together a press release stressing what the funds raised will be used for and include pictures of your entire flock at a prominent location.
Be sure to include full contact information and the usual who, what, when, where, why, and how in your press release. Distribute it to all the media contacts in your market and then make follow-up calls to encourage good exposure.
Profit tips - Maximize the success of your pink flamingo fundraiser by dividing your flock into various size groupings. Reserve a couple of big flocks for business locations and divide the rest into groups ranging from two to six birds. That way, a homeowner can easily ante up $20 or $30 to relocate two or three birds. And, the next victim won't resent being the recipient because it's not super expensive to keep the flamingo fundraiser moving on.
Good business targets are lawyers, doctors, dentists, realtors and other high-traffic professionals. Shopping center locations aren't as practical due to the lack of nearby placement options.
To attract even more attention, some groups even dress up some of their birds in funny outfits. For instance, a cancer fundraiser might use doctor's scrubs and nurse's outfits on each flamingo with a sign around their necks demanding payment.
One group dressed theirs up like workers on strike carrying signs asking for more money. A school group raising funds for sports team travel expenses placed signs around their necks saying they needed some travel money to get home. Sixty birds earning $10 a day for three weeks will raise $12,600!
Summary - Being creative and a little wacky in your approach can be a good thing with your flamingo fundraiser. Don't be afraid of offending someone because it's all for a good cause.
Work the publicity angle to create public awareness of what your fundraiser is all about. Divide your flock into various size groups and create multiple streams of income by having each batch relocated every day. Use funny outfits and signs to attract even more victims.
And most importantly, have fun with your pink flamingo fundraiser!
4) Yard Sale –
This fundraiser allows you to host an event that is a “win-win” for everyone involved. It allows participants to get rid of unwanted “junk”, and provides a huge profit for your organization.
-Select a location with greatest amount of car traffic. A school or Church work great. Do not try to do this in a home. The quantity of potential donations makes this impractical.
-Advertise locally. Signs, newspaper ads, etc.. are a must. Get the word out.
-Price items to sell. You want to maximize your profit, but also don’t want leftover items. Sometimes it is best to have non-donors do the pricing. They often over value their own items.
-Consider multiple weekends. Storage is a problem, but our second weekend has sometimes been better than our first. Customers find out what we are raising funds for, and offer their own items to help out.
5) Christmas Tree Lot –
We have made $30,000 in 3 weeks with this one. A Christmas tree lot requires a lot of work, but is well worth the effort. Potential customers would gladly take the time to purchase their tree from your lot when discover where the profits go.
We started our Christmas tree fundraiser by selling them “pre-order”. Students would sell trees to family, friends, and neighbors. Customers would place a deposit down, and one particular weekend, they could come and choose their tree. We would order a number of extras so customers had plenty to choose from. We were mildly successful with this, but saw the profit potential with starting a full-service retail Christmas tree lot. People were hesitant placing money down on a pre-ordered tree, assuming that they could not come and choose their tree – that it would be selected for them.
When we started our retail Christmas tree lot, we went all out! Rented fencing, purchased lighting and signage, built displays, and created a festive environment. The overhead was huge, but the profit was much bigger. It is a little bit scary when you start, but when you start to see the profit, the fears evaporate.
The single most important thing to remember if you ever attempt this fundraiser: educate yourself. There is a ton to learn in the Christmas tree business, and your lack of knowledge can create a scenario where you lose $30,000 rather than make a profit. I spent a lot of time reading, and called a bunch of tree growers and retailers to understand the product and the business.
We went very small our first year, and grew from there. You will want to make certain that you sell out your first year, and assume that past customers will return. We had our students “work” the lot, and paid them a “wage” toward their fundraising efforts that were applied to their account.
www.christmastree.org/
