Sponsorship advice

[leguffaw]

Good morning, everyone.

I have been living in ED for 8 months (my girlfriend has lived here for 4 years).

Been a long time admirer of the forum but only joined this morning and I am in need of drastic advice.

My girlfriend and I were both accepted to run the London Marathon on behalf of a charity.

This means we both have to raise a certain amount of money in order to run.

So far we are struggling coming up with the money.

Does anyone have any advice on how to raise our funds?

I was in touch with Sainsburys about doing a collection outside of the store but they don't allow that.

It's a tough time for everyone and obviously not a lot of people are going to want to give a stranger their money but it is for a good cause and as cliche as it might sound, every little really does help.

Any advice / help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

leguffaw

[Loz]

1) Start a page on http://www.justgiving.com/ (if your charity is listed there)

2) Spam all you friends, family, workmates, lovers and anyone else you can think of to go there and give you some dosh.

[Carrie]

Give all your work colleagues a tube of smarties and ask them to put all their 20pence coins in them once they have eaten their sweets- 20p coins fit snugly into the tubes - can't rememeber exactly how much each tube holds but I raised quite a lot of money that way - also did cake sales on a weekly basis - but I agree with Loz that Justgiving is your friend - just make sure you send a personal e-mail to thank the people who have donated rather than just relying on the automated response.

[Pickle]

Try an online auction? Get some bits and pieces donated by businesses if you can and auction them off - I know a few people who have done this and been quite successful.

Good luck

[Lost Yorkshire Man]

Get your friends to guess your time - ?5 a pop. Provide a prize for the winner

[RosieH]

Do you have a birthday coming up? You can "donate" your birthday and ask friends to sponsor you whatever they would have spent on a present / drinks for you in the pub.

[paragon]

You should change your introduction from "we both have to raise a certain amount of money in order to run" to "we decided to raise money for x charity because of x reason and as such are running the London marathon"

The perception I get from your thread, and loads of emails see going round work and with friends is that many people piggy back on the charity bandwagon because they want the experience of running the marathon as a personal goal.

I'd also say that you actually put some sacrifice in yourself, donate 10% of your salary on your own justgiving page, give up booze during the training period and donate that money. The birthday idea is a great suggestion.

I hate the deluded self promotion (this isn't aimed at you now) that people convince themselves they are motivated by charity. I think lots of people just think, I'm a bit fat, or unfit, I can't motivate myself to do anything but I know, if I enter the marathon I'll have to get off my ass and do some running and then they wax lyrical about the charity that had the lowest minimum amount to raise for a bond place.

[zeban]

I completely agree Paragon

[Applespider]

My sister is climbing Kilimanjaro next month and has to raise x amount of cash. She decided to put in herself what she would have spent on a holiday this year and has let people know that she's not expecting them just to subsidise a 'jolly'.

She's found that cake sales at work bring in most cash. People don't mind paying ?1 or ?2 for a slab of rocky road or a good cupcake when they know it's for charity and they're getting something out of it! - and you can do that on a monthly basis even to the same people. She's also done a raffle with the prize being a Christmas cake or sponge cake. If you work in a big office, try borrowing a trolley and sell it as a 'cake at your desk' service.

The local bingo halls let her do a collection on a Saturday morning to get some cash.

Raffles and sweepstakes can work well - you could ask a local shop if they could donate a prize if you don't have or can't make anything suitable. We raised cash for the RNLI recently with a sweepstake where you created a poster with 50 squares on it and sold each square for ?2 - then you randomly picked a 'winning' square who got ?50 and the RNLI got the other ?50.

[Sue]

A few years back I helped a friend with a boot sale to raise money (for SCOPE) for her sponsored trip to Machu Picchu.

We both got rid of quite a lot of unwanted stuff plus other friends also donated stuff.

Can't remember how much it raised but it was quite a considerable amount. You just have to watch for people nicking things (yep - even when she had a big banner saying it was all for charity).

[Pugwash]

A work colleague a couple of years ago had to raise ?1000 to walk up Mount Atlas for a hospice. She had 3 events in her house - a Morrocan Evening- we all paid ?20 and she provided food. A B B Q and bar where we paid for individual food and drinks (she got a drinks licence) and a cheese and wine evening.

Since over 100 people were invited to the Morrocan evening and only about 70 turned up between 4 and midnight, there was a lot of food left over. The next day she went all around her neighbours and invited them to a Sunday lunch for a ?5 to get rid of the food and raise extra money. I think she was about ?150 short of her target, so she and hubby but this in themselves. I think we also had a cake sale at work.