fundraising ideas please for volunteering trip

amibovered?

Hi

A colleague and friend of mine is going abroad as a volunteer and needs to raise the money to cover travel and accommodation costs.

We have started to do some fundraising, such as book sales at work for a £1.00, recipe sales, and a cake bring and buy sale.
These are all small-scale and there are only 30 or so people in the office so it feels like overkill.

Has anyone had any expereince of writing to companies etc to ask for donations - any tips??

Also any suggestions or ideas please for fundraising.

We only have until the end of the year so very little time for planning.

Thanks

GiveItBack

Simplest step is that you need to look outside of work. There must be other friends, family and interested parties.


Have they considered running things such as pub quizzes and raffles and so on. There are plenty of organisations that can help you to run a race night quite easily, and keep you right on the legalities.

Also, is this a challenge event - eg walk the GreatWall of China? An increasing number of people are funding (or part funding) the cost of the travel and accommodation themselves. If they are able.

Good luck

advent1122

A colleague and friend of mine is going abroad as a volunteer and needs to raise the money to cover travel and accommodation costs.

I am volunteering to drive across America for 4 weeks next June.
I will start in New York and finish in San Francisco.
How do I raise the money to cover travel and accomodation costs?
Could I also ask companies to help me with some spending money as I hear there are some fancy shops in New York.

amibovered?

Hi,
Thanks for the hints and tips. It's easy to forget that people are part of other networks.
Advent 1122- I agree that sometimes it can look like your paying for someone's holiday. But taking unpaid leave and then working all the time you're over there using your nursing skills isn't really my idea of a holiday!

skintas_2

jeans day, used to do it at my old work, wear jeans and donate a £1

Sallys_Savings

We (as a family) have raised thousands of pounds over the last two years for an orphanage that we are very closely involved with.

So I know how difficult it is to raise funds with just a few people involved.

I have had alot of experience with writing off to companies (fundraising for three PTAs and a sports group too) and you don't really get much. You may get something from a local football team, local zoo, local leisure centre, swimming pool etc but the bigger places don't want to know in my experience.

Have you thought about asking everyone in the office to commit to sell a minimum amount of tickets (say four?) they can sell more if they like. That way you'd end up with 120 people straight off . And have a function in a hall or pub? If you throw everything at an evening you could raise quite a bit of money in one go.

Make sure you get the papers involved (our local ones have always been really supportive..I was really embarassed at first but it really helped with our fundraising. They followed our trips and work abroad, everytime we went away they will put a piece in. They advertised our events in the article and bits and pieces we were collecting to take over there. Each time it was mentioned in the paper we would always have at least one person ring up. From the newspapers alone we have had one family holding their own car boot, an elderly lady knitting a teddy for everyone of the girls, a dentist donating toothbrushes and toothpaste, and a local sweet shop supplying us with sweeties to take over.

We've held car wash days, various raffles, darts competition (contact your local league because they may be able to help), Stalls at fetes (play your cards right and hoopla games), car boots, selling christmas crafts at craft fayres, auction of promises and quiz night, casino night, and a race night.

If you can supply photographs of where your colleague is going etc. it will help to get people interested.

Good luck...I'm sure your colleague will get alot out of it too

asdaprice

Have you thought of becoming a Tesco R&Rer and then raffling all the items you get refunded?

amibovered?

Hi
Lol!!
I actually tried that one night this week. Other half wouldn;t come iwth me because he said he couldn;t act all innocent! Went to Tescos armed with a list. Came out with over £100 of shopping reduced to £80 odd where all the discounts came off! The only item that didn;t was an olday body wash thing that was BOGOF in the end they said that it was "only the purple one".
So not a success story. Think if I had managed one item that would have given me the confidence to go again.

As an update on the volunteering we have managed to get a band to play for free and the donation of a free venue so now need to work out how to get some tickets printed etc (at little or no cost). So hopefully this should raise a bit more than the odd quid here and there.

GiveItBack

try getting someone to sponsor/place an ad on the tickets? printing.com can be cheap too. No, I'm not connected with them, and if anyone knows cheaper, please let me know.