auctioning gifts

bordercars

as part of our carnival we are having a tombola stall to raise funds for the air ambulance and macmillan charities. we have been given some fantastic items that are to good to just use as prizes, the idea is to use maybe 6 top items for an auction and keep a few to entice people to the stall.

the carnival organisers have a PA and are happy to auction items for us on the day, but I wondered about having something like a facebook auction, has anyone done one before and maybe want to point us in the right direction. such as do we start it as a page or create an event then invite all our local friends and leave it open for them to invite others.

can we also do paypal payments so that bidders can use a card to pay?

mandragora_2

Just a couple of thoughts:

Why not have an Ebay auction, 100% of profits to go to your nominated charities, with the ending timed to be 'live' at the time of the event, projected, and with the capacity for people at the event to log in and bid on site?

Secondly, both the charities you've named are well-established organisations with professional fundraisers on their staff and a lot of experience - why not contact their head offices and see what they suggest? At the very least, they may publicise it for you to a wider group of potential bidders.

Good luck with it all, and well done on getting so many good gifts donated!

Savvy_Sue

mandragora wrote: »

Secondly, both the charities you've named are well-established organisations with professional fundraisers on their staff and a lot of experience - why not contact their head offices and see what they suggest? At the very least, they may publicise it for you to a wider group of potential bidders.

IMO you absolutely must consult the charities involved: you are using their names in your fundraising, their trustees have a responsibility to say whether this is OK or not! It also helps reduce situations where someone says "it's in aid of xxx" but in fact it's a scam: if you have the official logos and full details of the charities easily available, it's a safeguard.

bordercars

thanks for the replies. we have documents from both charities, so thats covered. we dont have a lot of time, these came in last minute. and we have 1 week.

as an example of prizes we have a meal for 4 and a bottle of wine value approx £100 and a round of golf for 2 at a good club. really to good to tombola. any other suggestions as to what to do with them.