Fundraising Article

If you’re going on a volunteer trip or if you just want to get involved with a good cause, fundraising can always come in handy. Here at Gap Year, we thought we could put together some new and innovative ideas to save you some time. It might sound lame, but fundraising really can be fun, (no pun intended).

I thought I’d try some of these out and raise some money for the Betania Foundation. This is the charity that helps the Roma community. (Page 11 Project Romania)

Dip in to  your friends pockets

Not literally of course. Sponsoring only works if you know a lot of people that are willing to support you.

I ended up using the North Sea as a hangover cure on New Year’s Day. Running into the sea. Just think, English weather in winter, and jumping in to the sea. Cold wouldn’t cover it. But who out of your friends wouldn’t sponsor you to see the pictures of that? Trust me it was well worth it. Some of the people doing it raised over £200 for their charity!

Take it to new heights

I’d like to state, for the record, I am incredibly scared of heights. Yet I found myself jumping off Newcastle’s Tyne Bridge onto a tiny little wire in the air. Must admit, I was one hell of an experience, and now I can tick it off my bucket list, bonus. But there was another couple hundred pound in the fundraising jar for some people who joined me.

One tip for sponsoring, get a sponser form, and put a high number at the top of it so people will follow on from it. If 50p is the sponser above then people won’t feel so bad writing low money. Make it £10, it doesn’t have to be a real sponser, it can be a little

white lie.

I won’t tell if you don’t.

Make it an Event

Good old fashioned bake sales. Who doesn’t love cake, biscuits and a nice cup of coffee? If you go to college or university this could just be perfect. What student can afford a Starbucks now? Really?

Some people will just hear the word ‘fundraising’ and ‘char

ity’ and be willing to throw anything they can your way. I managed to talk myself into a free hall where I could run a table top sale. In just three hours the group I was with managed to raise over £300.

All we had for the table top sale were old toys, books, some DVD’s. Nothing major, just like a car boot sale.

We ran a raffle that day, getting free prizes from local companies; even our local MP offered up some House of Commons whisky for us. Classy! And the only other things that were making us some money was from bake sale and old things we found in our garage to sell – nothing special just car boot style bits and pieces.

With every event we had posters up in the local shops around the town and posted them through people’s letterbox near the event.

Others on my fundraising team ran pub quizzes and sold tickets, which the pub let them do for free. All they had to do was think of some questions. Some did themed charity balls at £25 a ticket, not too bad when the hall was free.

SELL

Loads of companies will buy old stuff that you don’t even use anymore off you. Bags2School are a company that will pay 50 pence per kilo for your old clothes, might not sound like much but when you approach all your family, friends and neighbours it really adds up. I made £160 for my charity.

You’ll all have seen the adverts for Mazuma Mobile and Music Magpie, and I dare say you will all know about the wonders of Ebay. It’s really not as hard as it seems to make some extra cash for a good cause.

It really is so easy to fundraise now, write to local companies tell them what you’re doing they are so often willing to support you with prizes, or sometimes even a cheeky grant here and there.

There are loads more of fundraising tips on

www.gapyearmagazine.co.uk