Sponsorship/financial help for community groups

skintarooney · 14 April 2008 at 12:11PM

Hi, I hope someone will be able to point me in the right direction. My daughter is a member of a successful local dance troupe and we are trying to raise funds for the day to day running of the group.

We already do many fundraisers but of course it would make things easier if we had some regular financial help from somewhere.

I just wondered if anyone here has had any experience of being sponsored by local businesses etc. If so how did this come about? Are there companies that are more willing to help than others?

Any info would be very helpful, everyone on here are so great, I thought I would make this my 1st port of call.

Thanks in advance!!:beer:

ahai1 · 14 April 2008 at 2:55PM

Try arts council, foundations and trusts. I cannot be of very much help right now as I don't know if it is a charity or not. I do know that the steady income that groups in the voluntary sector get are grants and that those grants are given for a certain period for example 1 financial year before they are reviewed or withdrawn altogether. Then there is project funding which is given for a certain project for example hiring a project officer for a fixed period of time.

skintarooney · 14 April 2008 at 4:16PM

Thanks for the reply. Should have thought to include more detail in my original post.

The dance troupe is completely voluntary run. We are not registered as a charity or a business. The leader does keep all the accounts up to date and we do have a bank account. Hope this helps.

Very grateful to you all!

ahai1 · 14 April 2008 at 8:17PM

Yeah it does help. One of the things with applying for grants and funding is the huge amount of paperwork involved I have seen people doing it and it can take anything up to a day or more just to get the stuff in and the chances are that you will not get the money. I once took a look at the Comic Relief reform and it was not that easy.

I would like to know are people willing to put the huge amount of time and manpower involved with no return?

Savvy_Sue · 15 April 2008 at 6:02PM

You're not going to know if you're coming or going, BUT ...

MOVING THREADS FOR BETTER RESPONSES

Hi, Martin’s asked me to post this in these circumstances: I’ve asked Board Guides to move threads if they’ll receive a better response elsewhere (please see this rule) so this post/thread has been moved to the Small Biz & Charity Organisers board, where it should get more replies. If you have any questions about this policy please email [EMAIL="abuse@moneysavingexpert.com"]abuse@moneysavingexpert.com[/EMAIL].

Over there, we've got some useful threads, including one on Fundraising as a sticky: there are lots of suggestions a few posts down in that.

skintarooney · 15 April 2008 at 9:11PM

Thanks for your responses. We are aware of all the paperwork involved with the possibility of refusal but it can all be put down to experience. The main thing is to try and help the members financially as otherwise the costs can spiral and since joining these forums I have made it my priority to save as much money as poss!

Savvy_Sue · 16 April 2008 at 3:30PM

You get better at applying for grants as you do more of it. At work we reckon we have a success rate of 1 in 5, whereas DH's work were finding it was more like 1 in 50. They're getting better now though ... simply through someone dedicating time to it!

fengirl_2 · 16 April 2008 at 4:09PM

Your problem is that, unless you are meeting some kind of disadvantage, you are going to find it hard going. Most funders will only fund charities for a start and those which are left are going to ask 'why should we subsidise some mother's little darling to go to dance classes?'
When I was a Lottery assessor, I assessed an application from a baton-twirling group in a disadvantaged area. I was satisfied that the girls in the group were gaining in self esteem from taking part and gaining useful skills and self confidence which could be transferred to everyday life. Everyone in the office disagreed with me, as did the Regional Committee, but I stuck to my guns and they got their grant (it was only £5k, but you would have thought it was £5 million by the amount of discussion it provoked).
Lesson is - can you show that your dancers are in a disadvantaged area and are not just attending the dancing for the sake of it? Funders want to buy something - so you have to find out what it is and sell it to them.

skintarooney · 16 April 2008 at 9:13PM

fengirl wrote: »

Your problem is that, unless you are meeting some kind of disadvantage, you are going to find it hard going. Most funders will only fund charities for a start and those which are left are going to ask 'why should we subsidise some mother's little darling to go to dance classes?'
When I was a Lottery assessor, I assessed an application from a baton-twirling group in a disadvantaged area. I was satisfied that the girls in the group were gaining in self esteem from taking part and gaining useful skills and self confidence which could be transferred to everyday life. Everyone in the office disagreed with me, as did the Regional Committee, but I stuck to my guns and they got their grant (it was only £5k, but you would have thought it was £5 million by the amount of discussion it provoked).
Lesson is - can you show that your dancers are in a disadvantaged area and are not just attending the dancing for the sake of it? Funders want to buy something - so you have to find out what it is and sell it to them.

I appreciate your honest reply. The group is run in a part of the city with is classed as disadvantaged. The government are at the moment throwing money into regeneration to improve the quality of lives of the children in the area.

The dance troupe has members from tiny tots right up to girls in their twenties and plays an important part in keeping these children off the streets for some of the time.

It also teaches them responsilbility and respect for one another and their sense of team spirit is second to none.

So I suppose, in a nutshell what I am trying to say is that no, they are not just a bunch of little darlings, they are children who deserve to have a little helping hand whilst doing what they love to do.

I know its not you I need to convince...perhaps I should get all that down on an application form.

Thanks.

fengirl_2 · 17 April 2008 at 6:52AM

Yes, you can certainly sell your project in the way described. It would help if you were a registered charity, which would be possible with the right constitution. Even Awards for All would be a runner.
Suggest you contact your local CVS.

kawasaki_dave · 19 April 2008 at 10:48PM

[quote=fengirl;10237431)_It_would_help_if_you_were_a_registered_charity,_which_would_be_possible_with_the_right_constitution..[/quote]

Please bear in mind there's a requirment to have income or promisary notes to the value of £5000 before you can register as a charity.

I've just posted this elsewhere to someone who was looking for cost effective ways of advertising his business, but it may be of use to you when approaching local businesses for sponsorship......

I'm the chairman of a new but up and coming charity (www.emtv.org.uk) and part of my role is to show local businesses that advertising by donating to us is far more successful than using conventional methods. Prior to my current role I was the national development officer and events manager of a similar charity organisation (all voluntary).

This is an extract from one of our sponsor presentations and is based on hard research:

Local Newspaper - £900.00
(£15 per 1000 readers - based on average price for full page advert and circulation figure (average 59800)
Local Radio - £4120
£17 per 1000 listeners - Based on average price for 90 x 30 second adverts and listener figures (245,000)
Leaflets - £3450
(£43 per 1000 distributed - based on average production and distribution cost (80,000)

Now if your business was to donate £100 to our charity you'd get mentions in our press releases, links from our website and the opportunity to place your company's logo or sticker on our vehicles. Should a company want to start hitting four figure sponsorships we put out an exclusive press release to local newspapers and radio stations, it's released on our website and you get larger stickers on our vehicles, mentions in our advertising literature etc.

Take into account that our vehicles attend around 10 - 15 events a year with at least 5 of those having an attendance in excess of 30,000 people, and you can see that it makes sense to use us to advertise rather than conventional methods.

Hopefully this can give you one line of "attack" when approaching local organisations for financial support.

Sponsorship/financial help for community groups

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