aibu to ask for your help with fundraising ideas

[wheresthelight]

without giving too much away my friend's daughter has been diagnosed with a rare form of cancerwith a very low survival rate and a group of us are trying to come up with some ways of raising money to support the charity that supports the families of sick children by providing accommodation at the hospital.

we have the usual cake see etc on our list of options but hoping you guys can help with some better ideas

Cakes are great, but also try to make something which is freezable?

Regrigerator cookies are great, you make them in a roll, and they take them home and pop them in the freezer, when they want biscuits they slice some off and bake them for 10 minutes and voila! freshly baked biscuits.

Car washes, if you live near a fire station or somewhere with a big area all the better.

If someone fancies themselves a chef, you can do a pop up restaurant, everyone donates one of the ingredients, and then people book places so all the ticket money is profit.

A quiz night at the pub

Someone with long hair, shaving it off

A guy with a treasured moustache, shaving it off

Hire the village hall and have a Christmas fair - if you have enough volunteers and somewhere with enough footfall you could make about £1,000 - £2,000 from it.

Hold a nearly new sale, but not necessarily limited to baby items.

You rent out the tables, and sell refreshments.

(These have to be advertised HEAVILY to work though)

Ohh fab ideas thank you!

unfortunately I know from experience that round here car washes aren't popular as we have a very large immigrant workforce who run very cheap and very good service.

the hair thing might be a workable idea just need to find someone willing

Do you have a good village hall nearby? That opens up all sorts of possibilities.

I haven't lived in this area very long and we all met through a baby activity so are spread all over so am sure someone has!

Another friend who also knows my other friend and her dd owns her own soft play hire company so am hoping she will be willing to donate her equipment so we can run a fun day

This may help with ideas

knowhownonprofit.org/funding/fundraising

Also would be worth speaking to your local CVS/ helper agency

data.navca.org.uk/members/directory

Good luck!

Night at the races - get a video of old horse races, everyone bets, winners receive some money and a decent cut goes to charity. We did this for London Marathon fundraising and it was a great success.

A halloween fun raising night, probably get shot for mentioning Halloween but it could take a few weeks to get sorted.

Bag packing, car boot, curry night, sponsed zip wire.

Invite a group of friends to dinner which you cook - they all have to pay what they might spend on a takeaway (or even a meal out) - you have a nice evening and raise £100 or more.

Are there any local events coming up where you could have a stall (autumn fair at school etc)? Raffle is a good one - get donations of things in a specific colour (just packets of biccies, bottles of shampoo, boxes of chocs) - red or blue are good - and then make them up into hampers with cellophane and a big box. Always looks so good that people will buy tickets at £1 each.

So sorry for your friend's DD.

Open up a just giving page with a text option if you haven't already and pop the link on all your fb.

A big swap shop? Everyone brings their unwanted clothes/shoes/accessories to the persons house with the biggest living room. You can either charge a taking part fee (of say £5), or charge 50p per item 'brought'. It only works if you and your friends are similar sizes though. Or, as your friends through a toddler group would a baby-child version of this work?

Good luck with the fundraising, I'm sorry for your friend and her DD

Book a circus and run a BBQ, £2k profit for the day. We have used the National Festival Circus and they're fab, 3 shows in one day, 150 seats per show, £5 per ticket. Local football or school pitch. Ask around to find somebody who works for Barclays or other large organisation, they will match fund up to about £750.

Good luck, I'm very sorry about your friend's child, best wishes to them.

I think the best way is to simply contact people you know as a group and ask if they wish to consider donating something ie miss out the middle man.

Lots of fund raising events end up as being quite costly for the organisers who might have been better to simply donate that money directly to the charity.

thank you ladies!!

the swap shop might be a good idea especially for kids stuff all our kids are around the same age but we could run it through the group we met at as the next wave are starting in September

knew you lovely peeps would have some ideas

I shaved my head and raised £1600. Best thing i ever did too! very easy way to get rid of roots

"Fireside" quizes - a page of anagrams or quiz questions, 20 or so is enough. Charge 1 per page, with a 10 prize for the first correct returned one out of the hat.

In my experience, people are happy to pay the 1 in return for a bit of fun, and very few people actually return them. The ones I've done I have related the quiz questions to the purpose of the fundraising.

Ohhh Melanie that's a fab idea thanks

Register the charity with easyfundraising.com. Get people to sign up (entirely free!), and the charity gets a % of money spent on various on line shopping websites. Amazon is one, but many others too.

Supermarket bag pack - from what I hear these can raise ££££ in just a few hours.
Raffle
Marathon/half marathon sponsorship, even organise an actual fun run.
Pull together a list of contacts at reasonably big local companies, lots of them have charity funds which they distribute at their discretion
Try local football/sports clubs for donations/prizes
Promote everything on Facebook and Twitter
Come up with a silly challenge to do through Facebook, set up an easy system for donations
Wristbands? Sponsored loom-band-a-thon! Could be something the kids themselves could do.
Fun day in a local park or social club, theme it (pirates/princesses/superheroes) get a bouncy castle, ice cream van, burger van, have some cheap tat for people to buy, set up ice bucket challenge station, face painting, some competitions.
Get charity tins into the local shops.
If you are really serious about raising money I would try and build up a programme of events over a few months as this will really raise awareness. Inform local press, get on the radio, even the local TV news may be interested especially if you can come up with some wacky ideas (sponsored back wax, boxing day dip, that kind of thing).
You could plan a huge Halloween party, you have a bit of time to organise something really good. Disco, buffet, face painting, competitions, silly games, cheap toys to buy. Ditto Bonfire Night if you prefer.

Ohh Katie I love those ideas thanks! unfortunately from girl guiding and scouting I know how impossible it is to get bag packs locally. the kids are all 1 and under so not sure there is much they can do. would people donate to a sponsored toddle/crawl?

never heard of the website link social definitely investigate that route.

Ohhh can't wait for us all to meeting next week to discuss and plan!

I am just hopeful that we can raise some decent amounts so something good can come out of such a horrifying situation.

my friends daughter is only 10 months old and the survival rate is virtually non existent

We did a charity fashion show a few years back, which netted us quite a lot of money. I can't remember the name of the company I used now and it was very local to me anyway, but I've just had a quick Google and I'm sure you can find someone that can do that for you.

It's a great way to get everyone to together and it's good fun.

My neice did a puddings and promises evening.
Every ateendee bought along a pudding or cake to donate then the (guides in this case, and their parents) auctioned off promises - paint your nails, one dad offered a man and van service to collect a shed, big brother mowed the lawn, mum would baby sit that sort of thing. Also any local businesses could donate vouchers for £10 off a hair cut etc, Free spray tan and they get free advertising.

Ohhh Maureen that would be ace! there are a few independent "boutique" style shops so hopefully we could get them on board and I know some very stunning young adults I can blackmail into modelling (suddenly my geeky guide leader job has a bonus) as well as lots of tots to do a kiddy section.

I love you guys!!!