I need your help ladies... We are a group of 12 people from work (of the 32 employees) entering a team into the Relay for Life- supporting a cure for cancer. On June 9-10, we will take turns walking, strolling, running, crawling around the race track for a 12 hour fundraising event put on by the Cancer Society. (I say crawling because it's an over night event) As a team, I understand there is a $1000 minimum goal in order to be a part of this. Our employer (who is also a part of our team) is paying the registration fee. We would really like to beat last years total for our team (which I believe was $1700) Here's the challenge: Two of us have stepped up to the roll of team captain We need to organize fundraisers for our team to raise money. The challenge being that this is a community event and so there are many other teams looking to raise money as well. So far, we are doing: Dessert day - buy coffee (or tea) and a dessert for $2.00. We will distribute fliers to local area businesses to let them know what we're doing - and I might even circulate around the mall parking lot to do the same. Casual dress day for a cure (employess donating $1.00 to dress in their normal clothes (jeans are not allowed though - our boss just won't go there) "Change for a cure" cans - for people to drop in some change if they feel like it or have spare change Summer basket raffle (so far we have over $200.00 worth of summer things in the basket and there's still more to come) We're challenging another pharmacy to meet or beat our total - pie in the face of the losing team Popcorn is being sold twice a week at the store for $0.50 a bag We have Crayola fundraising brochure coming to us (pray that other team members will want to do this) Each team member is given a pledge book to get sponsors and we have to sell luminary candles (for $5.00 each). At dusk, the candles will line the race track and will be lit in honor of a survivor or memory of a victim. The candles have the name of who ever you put on it for all to see as they walk by them. Then when that is done, the survivors do a victory lap around the track (young children and adults - that's going to be a hard one to see but such a victory) I'm looking for "low maintenance" ideas to raise funds... some of the team members want to be a part of the team but want to put in as little effort as possible. We haven't set a team goal for how much we would like to raise yet (we have a meeting to go to Monday night and we as a team will set the goal shortly after that). Andrew and I made a "thermometer guage" yesterday and took it to work to have a visual of where we are with our goal (how about that! we don't even have that goal yet :lol: I'm looking for any ideas you might have (and asking for you to pray about it too). I like a challenge and this will definately keep me on my toes for a couple months.
Brenda I cant think of any ideas for fundraising, but it sounds like you have already come up with some good ones for this great cause. I remember they did it in our city once. (or maybe its every year and I just don't know it) Cancer effects everyones family it seams. Good luck to you and your team.
Talk to a local restaurant about setting up a special night for your cause. We did this for our school reunion and made a TON! We went to a local restaurant and picked a regular weekday night as "our night". They agreed to pay us 10% of the nights sales if people came in and said they were there to support our reunion fund. Then, we did all the advertising (we told everyone we knew, hung up signs at work, told people at church, etc.) to go and eat there that night. It was a win-win situation: we made money for our project and they got a boost in sales on a weekday night that is usually a little slow.
Brenda, We do it every year down here. My dh is cancer survive and we go. Yes, Aball they do it every year. OkMom, idea is wonderful we have done that at Pizza Hut they are good about doing it and will help. Another idea is go to Sam's Club or a warehouse and buy some candy bars or candy and sell them. People will give you a dollar for a candy bar if they know where the money is going too. This one was always a good one too.
I love the idea of the restaurant helping out - WOW! There are a couple really good ones around here and Monday's tend to be the slower nights.... Hmmmm - thanks for that thinking cap idea. Kris... were considering that too Thank you Edited to say: I have a letter all done to give to the restaurant I have in mind. Please PRAY that they will be receptive to this opportunity. (Thanks again for the idea)
My future Brownie will be selling cookies next year. How about a bake table set up in front of a grocery store or other small, non-chain store? People do that here all the time for this same thing. Another thing- people here will rent out a fire hall for a dance. They bring in a d.j. or a band, snacks and munchies. They charge a small fee per person or couple. It looks to me like most are BYOB. I went to one such dance in my whole life, because I don't drink. There was a country/rock band, beer, soda, munchies like pretzels and chips and peanuts. When the band took a break there was recorded music. It ran about 3 hours. An idea to reach fuddy duddys like me- how about a Bingo game? You can rent bingo equipment once you have a place to hold it. Do it during the afternoon and you can get by with munchies and baked goods instead of hot dogs and hamburgers.
Where I live, fast food places like McDonald's and Burger King do that percent thing. You have people from your cause go in and help serve, I believe, and for that time slot you get 10% or whatever percentage they say of all that is sold. There are groups doing that quite often, and they tend to do well.
and with the groceries, ask the grocery store around you if you can tape coupons to the products, instead of using the coupons people are incouraged to donate the money of the same value to your charity. I am not sure how to explain it, but a group used to do that where we used to live in WA.
So if you have a .50 coupon for Fritos, you would tape it to a Fritos bag, the person would use the coupon and then give the .50 they save to the people doing the fundraiser? That sounds like a very interesting way of raising money! Whoever thought of it was being very creative!
I think its more like the clerk asks if you want to use the coupon or donate it to the charity, you say donate and the clerk puts it in a special pile at the end of the day the coupons are tallied and the clerk puts that money tally in a place for the person heading the fundraiser to collect (pouch kept aside in til or something). The people doing the fundraising goes to the store participating and tapes coupons they have collected to products. They may set out about 200 coupons but not all the people are going to "donate" them they will want the savings for their selves.
The ones I saw were for a dance troop, they had marked all the coupons with their own stamp (but you could use a punch to identify your coupons--like a star or heart shape) Talk to the store manager first. And make up small flyers to tape on the checkout stands, explaining and have a sample coupon taped to the flyer.
I see that a lot here. Maybe it's a WA thing? We have Boy Scouts, Brownies, Girl Scouts, etc. that do that. They usually have a little note taped on the coupon that has their name. It usually says, "Please donate this coupon amount to (Name of Charity). And, as Amy said, the Clerk puts it in a special place for the charity. Hey, If you are the first ones to do this in your area, you could do well. It happens so much here that they don't even put flyers up, and it may not work as well as it once did, cuz people get tired of it. But if it doesn't happen there, I'd put out the flyers and info. at the checkstands. Of course, the manager, or whoever you talk to, may have ideas (or rules) on how to do that in their store.
I would think it might work better in a small town, too. I've never seen it done here, but would be willing to do that. Also, the Christian school sells gift certificates for the grocery. You buy a $25 certificate, pay $25, and get $25 worth of groceries. Each certificate has the name of your organization on it. Then the STORE donates a percentage to you for each certificate used.
My role on the team has changed from a 'helper' for the team captain to THE team captain... Amanda (the other one I was working with) has other decisions that need to be made and doesn't have the energy to do this too (and I don't think she'll be working with me when the relay happens anyway - that's one of her decisions - she hates her job and doesn't want to be there). It's going to be a fun couple of months...
That coupon idea is very cool. My mom had breast cancer, so I wish you many blessings and much $ to donate to this cause. I will pray.
We are SO excited. We finished wrapping our summer basket today and started selling tickets for it - the price of the tickets is really cheap so I'm hopeful that they will go off with a huge bang (and they seem to be so far). Another pharmacy is interested in a challenge with us. Instead of something really wild or dangerous (like a basket ball game like what was suggested), on a specified date, we will count what we have made for money and the losing team's team captain will dye their hair for a day Sad to say but since Amanda stepped down as team captain (and is now off the team - she gave her two weeks notive today), more people are stepping up to help out. That's so sad but I can't control others... I sent out 6 or 7 letters yesterday to area restaurants with the pitch to help us out by donating a portion of the meal total to our team. PLEASE pray that they will be receptive to this. I am SO excited to see what a team of 11 can do. I'll keep you updated.
I AM SO EXCITED We started selling basket raffle tickets on Friday night and given that we had a SLOW weekend at work, they're actually selling quite well. We'll be starting a Crayola fundraiser soon and that's already generating A LOT of excitement... to a point where I don't have enough brochures and have to order some mroe - WOOHOO! We have challenged another pharmacy... the losing pharamcy's team captain on May 6 (with the lowest amount of funds raised at that point) will have their hair dyed (with temporary dye) on May 8 and wear a t-shirt saying they lost the challenge to the winning pharmacy. This is risky for me (being our team captain) because May 8 we have a foot clinic, and a major fundraiser in the store and so if I end up losing, there will be a lot of traffic in the store to see a funky hair do. I am exicted about this and am willing to do this if it means being able to motivate both teams to raising more money for a worthy cause.
Actually, losing could work FOR you. People come in for the Foot Clinic, and see your funky hair, and want to know WHY it's funky. You tell them, and ask if they would like to donate...... With normal hair, no one would ask.
I shouldn't count my chickens before they hatch - that could be dangerous... I am pretty confident that we won't be the losing team (but now that I have said that out loud, I could be in trouble). I was asked by a couple people on the weekend to make it a challenge for those who decide to sell tickets - to offer some kind of prize to the top ticket seller (gives them something tangable to work for and motivates those who might not want to otherwise sell tickets). When I suggested it to one guy today (who wasn't sure that he would be able to sell any tickets at all) he took off in good style and so far has sold more than anyone else (including me). Rather than use money from the actual raffle for the prize, I will just get something myself (movie money or a gift certificate for Subway). We're dressing down each Friday as one of our fundraisers and we have to wear a sticker saying why we're dressed down so that might be enough to get the word out there (along with all the other things we're doing). I might add a t-shirt for the winning team captain to wear - "I beat "X" pharmacy in a challenge" type of thing to help promote it that way. The other good thing about this whole thing, is that it shows a side of me that my employer wouldn't otherwise see (the ability to organize something big like this and the skills it brings out)...
