Each school year students work to raise funds for things they’re passionate about; whether it be a mission trip, organization, or sport team. But how can they determine which fundraisers will be successful and which will flop?
Here are five tips from Corban students with a little bit of experience:
1. Use your talents and be creative:
To raise money for the Woman’s Resource Center Claire Clubb and some of her musically gifted friends sold singing Valentine-grams on campus. Clubb attributes some of the success of the fundraiser to the Facebook invite that helped get the word out quickly, the table decorations that made them “more visible,” and the location that “helped circulate more people.”
2. Sell your stuff with a good attitude:
Shelby Mauermann said selling softball gear to students was the most successful for her this year, because there is new gear each year. She stressed the importance of your attitude while selling items.
“You have to be bold,” she said. “Have energy even if you don’t like to fundraise, be into what you’re selling, because a lot of times that will get the people excited.”
3. Look into options with popular businesses:
Applebee’s welcomes any group to fundraise with them as long as the group has a tax identification number. Pam King, a manager at the Applebee’s on Lancaster Drive, said your group must have a reasonable expectation to sell 100 tickets, and has to put down a deposit of at least $500.
The Haiti mission trip team did a Lime Berry fundraiser last year and will be doing it again this year in March. 20 percent of the proceeds go directly to the group when their name is mentioned between certain hours.
4. Send out support letters:
Jacob Bowdoin went to China last May and said sponsor letters are what got him there. He advises to be as transparent as you can in your letters, and added that “students are hesitant to ask their peers, but I think they should, because they will be surprised by the results.”
Esther Gallaway went to Haiti last year and will be going again this May. “God works through sponsor letters in ways we wouldn’t expect,” she said.
Her advice for writing letters echoes that of Jacob Bowdoin’s.
“Be honest about where your heart is in it, because that’s what people want to see,” Gallaway said. “Don’t limit what God can do. Sometimes we send letters to certain people just to be nice, and we don’t expect to receive anything, but then they blow your socks off and are so generous.”
5. Give it to God:
Gallaway said although her mission team started the Lime Berry fundraiser late last year God provided a lot. “The lesson there wasn’t about us or what we could do,” she said.
She added that as soon as her and her team members surrendered the issue of money to God is when funds came storming in.