Fundraising At Company Gatherings

When dealing with companies, fundraisers should be:

Listening to what the company is saying. E.G. How deeply do they want you to get involved with their fundraising, will you be sitting on any committees as an aid, offering yourself as the fundraising 'expert' if that is what you feel is being asked of you.
Look for any exchange that may be possible e.g. helping to promote the company by including their fundraising events in your newsletter etc.
Don't forget that sometimes it is necessary to discuss fundraising events that do not necessarily raise a lot of money but do raise company awareness of the charity. Obviously this is really only beneficial if the charity is being taken on for a period of time.
Remember that the more the people within a company trust you, the more opportunities will show themselves.
Try and ascertain if can get a group of company employees to represent you in the company.

Here are some company fundraising ideas:

Auction

Auctions work best when they are not too long and the prizes are worthwhile. The best auction prizes are those, which people have always said they were going to do or those, which seem such a good idea and appeal at that moment. The more you can make prizes unique, a one-off, the better the auction. Before considering the prizes discuss the background of the people at the function. Create a profile so you will have some good ideas of what prizes may be more interesting and also it may allow you to get the prizes sponsored if that target market is of interest to the donors.

Some ideas include:

A piece of sports equipment signed by a team e.g. golf bag signed by British Golf Team
Flying lesson
Driving a tank
Something signed by a celebrity/personality
Something promised by a celebrity/personality e.g. a personalised answer phone message
Weekend for two
Tickets to events e.g. Grand Prix
Naming a star in the sky

One company whose catalogue is quite useful is Red Letter Days on 020 8343 8822.

Prizes are hard to come by free. If you have contacts use them! Ask the company if they have any contacts, or suppliers who may be willing to donate prizes (Note suppliers when asked by their clients will often fork out some sort of prize.). See the lecture on Prize Bank - an idea to help have a stock of prizes you can use without having to go out and rush to get them!

Silent auction

This is where a numbered list of prizes is written on a board and people come and put down their bids. They must outdo the highest bid to date. The bid is written down in a duplicate book. They sign the paper and receive their copy. This keeps going until either the time runs out or you can then move the prizes to the stage (i.e. use it as a process of quick elimination).
This is good if you do not want the auction to interrupt proceedings but of course this type of auction must be well advertised and most of the bid will be done during the reception at the beginning of the evening.

Assault course

If the company is interested in publicising and galvanising their workforce this could be a fun day out.

Baby picture quiz

Get the directors to put their baby photos up in a contest. Put an entry fee on and employees have to guess who is who. Once completed all those who have all of them right go into a draw with a prize for the winner. This is a good idea for a newsletter prize but of course only if the directors are so inclined!

Evening events

E.g. Balls/Dances/Dinners etc. You don't really want to be organising a company ball you just want to be adding to the fun.

Carol concert

You want either just to be recipients of the collection or again by adding to the concert e.g. provide a celebrity reader (only if possible), a local children's choir etc.

Christmas cards

Don't forget to see if the company wants to take your card on as their Company Card or sell them to their employees through e.g. their staff canteen, reception etc. What else can you sell through the employee network (make sure you are not seen as being pushy).

Charity T-shirt challenge

Challenge employees to sell a set amount of stickers e.g. 12 stickers for £1 each to friend and colleagues. They send the £12 in and get a t-shirt in return. Again this is a good way to get employees to hear about you. If you are allowed, go to them directly. Up this idea by getting a celebrity to design your t-shirt for that specific company and get more per sticker.
This works because even if you can't be bothered to sell the stickers you are still likely to buy the t-shirt if it is original and good quality.

Cook book

Get Senior Management to write a cookbook. Well what I mean is get their favourite recipes to be written up (probably by wives). Get it made into a simple book e.g. a company may have a binder - just bind the pages and sell within the company. Again this is a bit of fun.

Easter egg raffle

A raffle at Easter for a cuddly toy. Unless you know otherwise it is probably best to keep tickets cheap and try and persuade 10 self-appointed people in the company to sell them. Ticket selling is almost impossible to do if you are not on-site. It is therefore better to work with a task force within the company who agree to commit a certain amount of time to work with you.

Essay writing competition

Perhaps not particularly interesting for employees but may be fun for children of employees. Get the parameters set; perhaps include something about your charity to be used. Get MD to choose the winner. Have prizes that hopefully the company will donate.

Games to play

Stand Up Sit Down Bingo (your local Bingo Hall should be able to help with cards and explain how it works, if not e-mail Alba Fundraising for further explanations).
Head & Tails (e-mail for details including your phone number - this may need explaining verbally!)

Mastermind eventquiz

Again this is a fun event that can be used to promote your charity and can be a lot of fun. Perhaps a pub local to the company will host and even sponsor the event, as it is good publicity for them.

Sport event

Companies may be associated with leisure centres/social clubs that employees may be affiliated to. These needs to be tailor made and discussed with those people.

Swear box

This may be a more fun way for a collection box to be used!!!

Second-hand book sale

Company employees bring in their old books on a certain day and have a book sale in a space e.g. canteen. Make sure that this is publicized and that you have a minimum amount of books! Get a team of employees to pledge their support and collect books in advance.

Sport competition

This will depend on what the company employees and senior management do and what kind of culture exists. Some sports ideas: Golf tournament, Darts Evening, Cycle Ride, Bowling Evening, Badminton Competition, Football Match, Go Carting Match, Gym Challenge.

Conclusion

The more you are trusted within a company the more you will be privy to hidden agendas, what people want to get out of the fundraising, how enthusiastic they are. This will mean you are better equipped to think about what fundraising is appropriate for that particular organisation. One company that I worked with over a year ended up giving me their database of all their outlets and the managers names which gave me a much more direct access to help with motivation, ideas etc.

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