If you’re in need of fundraising inspiration, then why not try a RAFFLE?
Loads of Thighsers are doing raffles this year (we did one at our fundraising ceilidh) and they’re almost always an absolute winner.
Jack de Aguilar (Glasgow-Bristol) raised over £1,500 with their online Instagram-driven raffle, thanks to prizes donated by friends and the greedy self-interest of gambling-addicted rafflers.
The latest fundraiser to catch our eye is Robin May (Milan-Trieste), who is raffling off a 2-night stay at a beautiful off-grid traditional timber roundhouse or luxury converted Victorian train carriage. We feel bad telling you about this because it massively reduces our chances of winning.
The basic idea is that people enter the raffle by making a donation to your fundraising page.
At the end of a defined period, you draw eligible donors out of a hat (or randomised spreadsheet) and send them their prizes.
Easy!
Step 1: Brainstorm and gather prizes
- What awesome things can you make or give away? (e.g. a painting, stack of cycling books, or a bike you don’t use anymore)
- Is there anything you can do for other people that is worth raffling off? (e.g. graphic design, online yoga class, bike service)
- Ask friends to donate something awesome, either things or services
- Ask friendly local businesses too (e.g. bike shops, breweries, restaurants, health clubs, velodromes). They might simply want to support the cause, but you can also appeal to their bottom line and suggest a discount voucher – the raffle might get them new customers!
Step 2: Figure out the rules and setup your fundraising page
- How long will entries be open for?
- Do you want a minimum donation amount for entry into the raffle? (e.g. £10)
- Can people enter multiple times or does the size of the donation give them a higher chance of winning? (e.g. 1 ‘ticket’ for every £10 donated)
- How and when will you notify them if they’ve won? An easy way to do this (unless you know them personally) is to use Justgiving’s ‘Say Thanks’ feature to give them your email address / phone number
- How and when will you send them their prizes? (e.g. is this limited to the country where you live or can you send them digitally?)
Step 3: Promote the raffle
- Tell all your friends, family, colleagues, passing strangers to buy tickets and share your page – everyone LOVES a raffle
- Ask anyone who’s donated a prize to share your page too – they will be proud to support the cause!
Step 4: Draw the winners and send them their prizes
- If you’ve got loads of entries, log into your Justgiving fundraising page and peruse all your donors by clicking on ‘Edit’ and then ‘Donations’ at the top
- Remember to remove ineligible entries
- Randomise winners, either the traditional way by printing the names out and putting them all into a top hat, or by copying and pasting all the names into Random.org’s magical list randomiser
- Get in contact with the winners. Justgiving’s ‘Say Thanks’ feature should do the job
- Send them their prizes
Don’t forget to publicly announce the end of the raffle and celebrate all the money you’ve helped raise for awesome grassroots refugee projects!