To think no good deed goes unpunished

[caffelattetogo]

Please tell me if IABU...

I was asked to run a fundraiser for a group my DC attends. It's a class to teach something I do professionally, and I have done for many years. All good, until it came to setting the ticket price - the treasurer looked on my website and saw how much I usually charge for a session. But this is in a village hall, not the venues I'd usually use, which cost much more to hire. I'd thought we could charge less than I usually do, as the experience won't be the same.
But maybe I was wrong: Tickets went on sale and have sold out.
I said I'd buy the materials and invoice them. No need, says the treasurer, and asks me to send her a list.
The session is on Saturday and the ingredients have arrived - with loads missing and much cheaper quality than I'd usually use. There's no way the food we are making will look or taste the same. I rang tonight and she isn't budging - says my list was too expensive and would eat up their profits. In total, the ingredients I wanted were about 25% of the ticket price. I'm giving my time and equipment for free.
Any other circumstances and I'd walk away, but I feel bad for the people who have bought tickets.
What should I do?

I think you are within your rights to cancel because you can't proceed with the ingredients given, but I do think both you and organisers are really disorganised and careless for not discussing what your costs would be when the ticket prices were set. How on earth do you manage to run a business without discussing you monetary requirements with people paying for your services?

But OP isn't charging for her time and thought it had been agreed that treasurer would buy the items she listed.

I mean I'm sure OP has learned an invaluable lesson about charitable events going forward avoid them like the plague but all you can really accuse the OP of is a bit of naivety, it's really the choice of the charity how much the tickets are set at and to an extent people do expect to pay a bit more because it's a bit of a donation as well as an event.

When I first posted I thought we were talking about a professional scenario, with the kind of cookery demonstration people pay £20+ to attend involving fresh halibut and olive oil from a private estate in Tuscany (yes, I once paid silly money to attend a cookery demonstration by Ruth and Rose of the River Cafe). But as it appears to have been scuppered over an argument about £10's worth of ingredients I suspect that we're talking very small scale indeed.

Shades of Mapp and Lucia, if anyone remembers them. My sympathy's with the people who bought tickets in good faith and have had the rug pulled.

@VWdieselnightmare how do you know how much difference it would cost to get the ingredients to the appropriate level ?

I'm assuming the event is in a church hall or similar with presumably at least 10 participants. Butter is around £2 a pack and a small tub of clotted cream is similar. I don't know exact amounts, but would suspect it must be more like £50-60.

Now if it were me, I'd make a few choice remarks, then - if I could afford it - I would buy anything that simply can't be replaced, but live with some shortcomings e.g. Tesco value strawberry jam rather than Finest range, and hope I could offset as tax deductible on my return as for charity.

Cancelling at such late notice is bad news for everyone.

Margarine....they lost any support at that point!

Passive aggressive is engaging a third party in a complaint you have about about someone else. Especially to a captive audience, meant to stay silent. The people attending the fundraiser didn’t pay to listen to whining or to be taught to bake something with ingredients that can’t possibly work while making excuses about it.

What you suggested is just like making belittling comments about your spouse while out with other friends. It’s tedious and annoying and no one wants to listen to it.

OP’s decision was the right and admirable.

This, immediately. I can't see that OP has already said she's done / will be doing such a message.

I’d tone it down; that seems too dramatic for the circumstances.

“The committee determined they were not able to provide the ingredients needed for this event to be successful.”

Factually true and with no emotion.

I wouldn’t apologize or even say I had pulled out. The committee really made this decision, not the OP.

Yep, this. Factual and not trying to attribute blame. Anything else is a waste of time and/or will cause trouble. These village committees are a nightmare.

Well done for standing firm. I do a lot of voluntary work with different organisations but some seem to feel them being in need of funds exempts them from behaving professionally with volunteers

Completely agree that you need to get ahead of the game and post on your website/socials that with regret the charity were unable to source the required ingredients for your workshop so you've had to withdraw from the event.

It doesn't need to be snarky or pointed - but you do need to get the first word in, else you could end up with a negative reputation for pulling out.

I’d probably make it like an announcement, then take it down after a few days. I’d want to gauge how many in my audience would even know about the event. If it’s 30 people out of hundreds of followers and customers, I wouldn’t want to draw unnecessary attention.

Also since OP has not been back for a while today, I’m betting the committee caved rather than cancelling.

Cross on your behalf. Them maximising on profits = you personally taking all risk on their behalf.

If they want a margarine event then they do it themselves, not using your name and reputation to pretend it's high end when it isn't.

Good for you OP! They’re taking the piss.

Well done for standing up for yourself. I’m really sorry your good deed was scuppered by someone not valuing your time and reputation.

You did the right thing.

tell her you teach what you teach in way you decide with raw materials you decide are best to get results you want to deliver

if she wants to teach it herself, in her way, with her ingredients and standards, rock on.

you can’t both teach, so you’ll be stepping aside for her to run the class herself

I agree with this. It’s a calm, simple statement. Less is more.

As I was reading the first half of the thread I was in full agreement with you pulling out, but somehow it still sounds a little petty to be flouncing over squirty cream. I’m not sure why there’s that perspective shift for me.

@Nonplusultra

It’s just a complete bait and switch. They asked her to do something she has done many times, then said “but do it with completely different ingredients.”

They may think she should know how to get good results with the items they purchased, but I bet she doesn’t. It would be an entirely different recipe to one she’s tested, honed and perfected.

I would not feel good about giving people a different experience to the one I originally advertised, even if I was not concerned about my own reputation.

Well done for standing up for yourself

So is it a cookery lesson. Or are you providing food at the event.

She should have checked with you regardless.

Absolutely not OK for her to just go ahead and buy things that are different and lesser quality than what you asked for.

You've made the right choice. Using cheap ingredients to deliver a high end workshop that the attendees are paying for would not only damager your reputation but be deeply unfair to those paying full price to attend.

I've both attended and delivered workshops. There's a world of difference between high quality and cost-cutting results.

The treasurer got greedy, wanting to keep a higher proportion of the funds than is possible. More fool her.

It's not a case of a difference of £10 between what was on the list and what was provided. Op states that her list of ingredients would have cost around 25% of the ticket sales, the ingredients provided by the committee has been estimated at no more than 10% the total ticket sales and that the committee have told her they can't " afford' to increase the costs as they are relying on the 90% profit as their only income from fundraising this month. However, the op not only regularly uses the requested ingredients but runs a successful business using this template and also includes venue costs and pays herself from the same size pot of money