To be upset mums at school seem totally disinterested in helping me fundraise

[Kiwikiss1]

My children attend a private school and many of the parents there are fairly comfortable financially. I am running the London Marathon for charity and have started to fundraise. After Christmas, I put a notice on the class FB page saying that if anyone had any excess toys, clothes etc they were planning to get rid of, I would collect it and sell it at a car boot sale and donate all proceeds to my charity. I received no response. I put the same message on my town's community page and received an overwhelming response and now have a shed stuffed full of items to sell.

Tonight I asked a group of school mum friends if they could recommend a restaurant in the town my children's school is located in which would have the space to allow me to hold a fundraising function. I planned to ask the venue to offer a set menu for a discounted price and raffle off donated prizes (such as a restaurant voucher, beauty treatments and free personal training sessions). I only asked as I do not know the town that well as we live in another location. Again, I have received no response (although they have all seen it).

I consider these women to be my friends. We have gone for many nights out and I am always first to donate to any group-brought birthday presents (of which there are many, although I have never been on the receiving end of a gift for my birthday) and offer support if they are going through a tough time. I want to organise a cake sale at school to help fundraise but now I am worried my friends will not be receptive to being asked to donate some goods to sell. Trying to bake everything myself will be a bit of a challenge!

I guess I am just confused as I have always been the first to help them, and now no one seems prepared to help me, even though it is for charity. I am not a fundraising 'bore', this is the first time I have ever asked for any support. AIBU to feel a bit disheartened?

This is your cause, not theirs and you can't berate them en masse for not donating to your cause.
Everyone has their own priorities and charities that they donate to, being forced to support someone in their endevour to run London Marathon might well irritate them.

OP, you’ve had a hard time here which is a bit unfair as you are giving up your time and putting your own resources into raising money. You are obviously just doing what you think is right.

The collective strength of responses here should give you a bit of insight into why you are not getting a response. At least you know it isn’t personal!

Do come and join Run Mummy Run

Pickle ffs really? I wonder if he knew and just didn't tell me, I will need to check now!

Laguna, he might just have read the forms wrong! He might have a penchant for London Marathon themed training tops though

You’re asking too much of the same people. If they’ve given to the just giving page then they’ve donated to you. You can’t then ask them to donate stuff to sell or raffle, buy cakes at a cake sale and make cakes too and go to a restaurant and pay for a meal and raffle tickets.
Usually people do one of these only.

The other problem is which charity it is, people might not want to donate to the one you’ve chosen.

When people at work do the London marathon, I generally donate a fiver to their JG page if I know them.

I've got a colleague who raises funds for a school in Africa she has links with. he asked me before Christmas to buy a ticket for a dinner dance to raise funds. The ticket was £60 and was not something I'd have any intention of going to. I said no, but gave her £5 towards her charity. Few weeks later, she was asking for money again, I refused. She's like ''But it's for charity!!!'' I then reeled off the 6 charities I donate to monthly, which are causes close to my heart, and said I already do my bit for charity and wasn't willing to do more.

A cousin of mine is wanting to do one of those charity treks across the Andes or whatever and sent an email round to raise the funds to get her out there in the first place. I may give her a fiver or whatever for the trek but I certainly ain't donating to getting her out there. To me that's a glorified holiday.

Many people have their ''own'' charities they support and while they may donate a bit of spare change here and there to others, aren't willing to put themselves out. Personally, I support animal charities, homeless charities, the Trussell Trust and Macmillan Cancer Support-the last is in honour of my mum as they supported her when she was ill and then dying of cancer, the others are because of my own strength of feeling towards animals and social inequalities/injustice.

Youve made me laugh pickle...I strongly suspect the "reading the form wrong" option.....He knew I wasn't happy about not getting the money back at the time

The chances of getting into the London Marathon are now 17:1 on the ballot. There are also club places and good for age categories based on performance in other recognised events. The charity places which tend to ask for £1000 to £2000 take up a large proportion of the places available.

It's very much a victim of its own success. It's an iconic, well established world class marathon and is a bucket list event for many runners in a way that smaller regional events aren't.

I'm a regular runner who will do halfs. I like the idea of running it some day, (the crowd atmosphere would be amazing and not replicated elsewhere in the UK) but realistically it would only be on the back of a few attempts on the ballot. I simply can't afford the risk of having to donate ££££ to a charity for the experience.

Either you have to be rich enough to give that amount of money away in which case it becomes a race mainly targeted at very affluent people, or more commonly you take the approach that OP is trying of spreading the load with lots of smaller events which tends to be more successful than pure sponsorship.

I'm sorry OP is feeling unsupported by these "friends". The presents part sounds rather one-sided.

Hopefully spreading fundraising across the wider community can help OP towards her target.

I don't have charity fatigue but I do have runners fatigue, it's the new fad and I'm sick of hearing about how far someone has run, seeing Strava or map my run stats on Facebook or sitting with friends having a meal listening to a runner bang on about how many fun runs they've entered.

It's the Juice Plus of sport.

I've also had a marathon fundraising friend who for about 12 months did nothing but pester us for money in various ways such as donating our old dvd's, raffles and table top sales. Along with the majority on here I support the charities close to me and she was raising money for a pre eclampsia charity purely because it was the only one who accepted her.
Perhaps you've inadvertently been like this and your friends have switched off.

UrgentScurryfunge
You put it better than me.

Charities are getting far too many places in these types of events and it's starting to feel very much like a cash cow than a running event.

I'd love to do the marathon one year, but the odds for the ballot are bad and you are charged money just for applying for a ballot place which isn't refunded if you don't get a place. It's increasingly an excuse to milk money from people.

Most of the OP's efforts seem to require other people getting actively involved with some quite big asks.

I'm so fed up of other people's fund raising- particularly the ones where it would be impolitic to ignore.

@Laguna sadly runners are a disingenuous bunch of addicts...

Oh, these trainers... Oh yes, they've been at the back of the wardrobe for years...

Oh that race, my finger slipped on the keyboard. Isn't that a gorgeous medal though...

Don't trust a runner as far as you can chase them

Sorry OP but I would hide from you in the playground.

DH runs loads of marathons, not for charity, it’s his hobby and has no desire whatsoever to run the London marathon, he said he couldn’t think of anything worse

I don't mind that the London marathon is largely populated by charity runners who have to find a few thousand for the charity to run. To be honest, I'd be really annoyed if the only people who benefitted from the horrendous disruption were the runners themselves.

To be fair, OP does say that her local community (apart from school mums) have given her stuff, so the charity probably isn't Save The Mosquitos or something politically contentious. But she's still asking too much of school mums - not just a few quid, but time and effort - and it may be that there are already several of them fundraising for other charities so they feel that they have done enough 'for charity' as it is.

I've noticed the cash cow bit at smaller events like 10ks. Running 6 miles is definitely a challenge to many people, and fair play if you and the people you know are happy to use that event to generate some sponsorship, but I do raise an eyebrow where there are clear signs of corporate charity fundraising such as groups of people in matching charity t-shirts.

It is undermining and fatiguing to people fundraising for much more significant challenges. The training for a marathon alone is a massive challenge and commitment.

Parents with kids at school are overwhelmed by requests for charity donations- usually through the school

Barely week goes by than some sponsored event/ bring in a pound for X, wear something red.
It is beyond tedious how schools are targetted as cash cows by charities.
The community at large are more receptive as they are not subject to the same demands.

Don't take it personally OP.

Urgent sadly I think you're right, this is his big one for charity but did notice money coming off our bank before that he "forgot" to tell me about.... the Stirling marathon apparently!

I’ve run a couple of marathons. City ones but not London.

A colleague who works with a very local charity very close to my heart has promised me one of their London places if I want it. I’m not sure. But I would regard the fundraising target as basically an entry fee (especially as I’d only be six months past my last marathon beg). So I agree with those above saying that London is for ‘rich’ people.

Having worked in a private school foe a number of years, this is hardly an unusual circumstance. We wouldn't want to 'put it in the newsletter' either.

I take it your place is subject to a minimum sponsorship requirement too?

Therefore, you're asking other people to pay for your experience.

YABU. If you care about the charity that much just make a donation. An expectation that people should pay you for having a fun (if challenging) time is really off.

Makes me want to go set up a Go Fund Me page to finance therapy I require because I'm a little offended that my elderly neighbour boby-shamed me while I was putting out my bin-bags - and toy boys - in my bra racously at 2am today while riding a surfboard through the drains.

I was only doing it for the NSPCC and it didn't psychologically scar her grandchildren nearly as much as she implied.

Ungrateful little wretches!!

I'm running London marathon this year

Need £1,150 for my small charity

Problem is nobody as heard of the Syndrome so don't want to donate.... bigger well known charities get all the funds. It's not fair!!

I signed up fully prepared to pay the fee myself, so not a massive problem.

What's the charity op?