People who take offence when you decline their request

[Tinksee]

I am a writer and have been asked to donate some of my books, free of charge, to a local fundraiser.

The funds being raised are going towards repairing a historic clock in my town.

I have no interest in the clock and can’t afford to give away my books.

I have politely declined and the organiser has taken offence.

Am I being mean?

Ginslinger - the event is an Xmas fair and I mentioned that my poetry is incredibly** morbid not very Christmassy.

She said that I “misunderstood” her aim which she never explained or clarified in the first instance which was to embrace all elements of the “festive season” including the darker elements such as poverty, spending Xmas on the streets etc she was jumping on moral high ground

I’ve had problems with this woman in the past. She’s a do gooder who never actually does anything...

thank you!

I have this same issue - I get requests for donations all the time and got yet another today. I did say no, saying I'd already donated to two other rescues this month already - which I have.

I am thinking in future of saying that I will only consider requests that come from previous customers that are working with charities etc as I get so many. Particularly as I get so many total strangers asking.

Thanks all - it’s the fact they take offence that you won’t “support” their “cause”. They try and guilt trip you, sulk and huff...

Anyway, she’s probably bothering someone else now..,

I constantly get asked for freebies for events (work in the venue dressing sector), sometimes quite large ones, with the usual promises of publicity etc. I now have a policy of sending them a form to fill in, on which it asks for information about what they think the value of what they are asking for is (they are always laughably off the mark), details of their previous orders/spend from my business and what, if anything the business might benefit from in return (we don't always expect anything in return to be clear). V. effective at filtering out the chancers and we often never hear back since they either realise they are asking for the moon on a stick or they want a free gift but can't be arsed to fill in a single sided form for it. I think a lot of people who ask for these things just have no idea of what they are asking for. Sometimes it's thousands of pounds worth of materials and a week or more of our highly skilled time. Telling me a "celeb" from TOWIE will be there isn't going to make requests like that more attractive either.

That’s a smart idea Muddling!

We get several requests a week.
It's staggering how often organisers of local events over estimate the value of their advertising and assume that small local businesses can afford to give their product away.

Top tip - walking in to a local business that you have never bothered your arse to visit or support before and then asking for a freebie because your school/charity/event is....local....is unlikely to have the result you want

My standard (slightly edited to sound personal) reply to such requests is that I have already committed to a charity/cause that I feel strongly about and focus on supporting that. It is true but also far more effectively creates good PR for me in my target market. The amount of random fundraising requests on social media is ridiculous. There was a lot of emotional blackmail to donate to a family member after a bereavement. It was grabby and cheeky, as that person is reasonably well off.

Temptress
I do that too. I very obviously support a local charity which relates to helping young people like my son. It's a good deflector which has the benefit of being something I'm hugely supportive of.

We regularly get asked to supply free product for the 'green room' before TV shows - usually Graham Norton or Jonathan Ross. The proviso is always the TV company cannot publicise the brand, but the celebs might.
They don't. We have seen some of our competitors desperately trying to engage the celebs on Twitter about thei freebie, to be met with a wall of silence.
We don't give anything away for nothing these days, unless it is to help a good customer or a worthy local cause.

Yes, in declining this person’s demand request, I mentioned that I support one particular charity and am committed to that.

DH did a really challenging sponsored event for our businesses chosen charity
A couple of times he asked the people who came in for raffle prizes if they wanted to sponsor him

'We regularly get asked to supply free product for the 'green room' before TV shows - usually Graham Norton or Jonathan Ross. The proviso is always the TV company cannot publicise the brand, but the celebs might.'

Wow, that is super cheeky of the media company, none of whom are struggling charities. There was recently a spot on Twitter exchange from a Liverpool baker in response to demands like this from media companies and z-list celebs. I'll try to find it, but it was pure cold.

YANBU, OP.

This seems to be a regular thing with authors/writers, their work product is not respected.

I am a member of the Society of Authors and one of the themes that comes up again and again is that schools/festivals/book fairs etc do not want to pay an author to come and speak about their book. They always use the "it's a promotional opportunity" line. Some offer expenses, which is something, but some seem to think that authors are made of money. Very few rise to anything like the dizzy heights of JK Rowling. If a festival can't afford to pay an author, they don't have a feasible business model for the event.

Because I have a strong business social media presence, I kept getting more and more requests that were pretty emotionally blackmailing. I amused myself to totally derail their appeal by high jacking it to talk at great length about my own chosen charitable cause. This has led to new queries drastically tapering off….

I was also going to mention the Liverpool baker asked to give a free cake to X Factor.

here

I love that story about the baker - I think I will do the same next time I am asked for free goodies. Had to laugh at the comment wondering what all of the fuss is about because it's just flour and eggs! If only!
Expat, we get asked for freebies from big companies all of the time - BBC Good Food for their summer and Christmas shows, Cosmo for events they are holding, all of the TV companies, the Guardian, various cinemas for special (commercial) screenings, London Fashion Week ... I could go on and on. Still think the cheekiest was the abovementioned Top SHop for their HQ staff though!

She even had the nerve, when she initially asked for the books, to tell me that I had “better have a good excuse” for not “supporting” her cause!

You have the best excuse ever, which is:

"I don't want to"

Who needs more?

She sounds pretty horrid, OP!

People need to organise better, and realise that a concrete request works better than `'give me an open-ended commitment that I can abuse", or a freebie with no benefit to the giver.

E.g. I cannot be bothered with the passive aggressive general asks about helping out at the school fete from the PTA. But ask me to make one cake for the 'Guess the Weight of the Cake' competition on X date and I will.

Someone who can't afford to pay a speaker should ask for donations to enable them to pay a speaker. Someone who wants free books should offer the donor a specific opportunity to market themselves at the event or hobnob with useful people at another event.

Asda doesn’t accept exposure when I pay for my weekly shop.
Exactly!

I am a writer, I get sick of this. I have a certain amount of free books from my publisher and once they are gone, I have to pay for them. I also get asked to donate my time as well and people always say, "Think of the exposure!" I need money to pay my bills - people die from exposure. Also, ya know, it is WORK, it's what I do for a living. It's really fucking insulting to expect me to be the only person in the room working for free as a lot of festivals and schools think I should.

Diser and Krusty - it’s maddening, isn’t it?

This particular lady is notoriously grabby and demanding.

Seems to think that local writers/artists etc should be falling over themselves in order to provide her with freebies in exchange for “exposure” and a nice, warm feeling from helping her broken clock campaign.

Annie - I did say a barbed jokey comment about my books not being available for free and she messaged back “I’ll take that as a no, then?”.

Yes, Madam clock bore, that would be the general idea.

cathf

What product do you make, out of curiosity? Is it food?