fundraisers without selling things
 

Does anyone know of any fundraisers that groups don't have to sell things? I know places like Great America lets organizations work to raise money for their groups, but are there anything else like that out there?

Car Washes? I don't know if you really consider that "selling something." my definition of selling something is if you go door to door selling candy or in our case, Party Lite candles.
I live up in Sacramento and I know that some organizations are allowed to pass out newspapers or something like that at the state fair to promote the Sacbee.
But back to car washes... check out Walmart... i have heard of organizations getting lots of money from that cuz Walmart also gives back money or something like. Don't quote me on that one... I would call them.

Sorry I posted twice on accident :rolleyes:

I think walmart will match what you make on a carwash and they will let you use their parking lot and H2O but I am almost sure the money has to go to a charity.

Hmm, we did a jail n bail for CMN, but i can't remember what we did for fundrasing.
I want to do a carwash. (reminds me of high school swim team/PomPoms carwashes..haha)

well i guess this is selling but you really dont have to do too much for it. Over here in san francisco us pi kapps are going to work the giants games at a booth selling hot dogs and the usual things. We get like a 8 to 9% cut of the total of what we sell and we walk out with about 500 to 800 each game. Its a good idea for you organizations where you have big sport teams near.

Just to add something, doing work for your philanthropy doesnt always mean raising dollars for them. You can hold seminars about your philanthropy raising awareness or giving up you and your chapters time to a hospital, or disability center or something that fits with your philanthropy. Sometimes spending time with people and making them smile is worth more than raising money!

Yard Sales make fantastic fundraisers because they're pretty easy to put together and all profit. Plus, everyone has stuff to get rid of. Yeah, the profits won't be large, but we've always done well with them, with minimal work.

It is kinda of selling, but we do final grams at the end of every semester. we send out letters to parents (we get them from the registrar). We charge something like $20 a piece. they have food, toys and some stress thingy. our cost is like $4. we make like $1200 a semester. We deliver them by hand. Just make sure you get addresses and phone numbers from parents. we use excel to keep them straight. parents can write their own message. frosh parents love it. they are so worried about their kids. We have a small college (1100) and it is residential. so that helps but you could maybe do it somewher smaller.

also- in HS my track team at Valentines day organized the flowers that were delivered to the HS students and staff. We got a bit of money for it. we did delivery's and sorted. some flower shope may let you help deliver in the dorms. that's just a thought. :)

Tau Love and Mine :)

ok, I dunno know if u consider this selling.

We have a date auction. We gets girls from our chapter and then guys from all the frats and auction them off to the higest bidder. Its a lot of fun.

We also have had Mr. Oglethorpe(my school) padgents, each organization on campus are invited to put up one guy then people pay 5 for tickets to come see the pagent. Everyone came b/c everyone knew someone in it, we made a fortune.

Another sorority on campus, sold tickets to an all you can eat spagetti dinner at their house. All the guys came b/c it was only 5 dollars.

i hope these ideas help

Check out what Phi Kappa Psi is doing on ebay. One of their auctions is for a week in Key West (bid starts at $500) at a nice bungalow, and they have alot more. They must have gotten their alums to donate all kinds of stuff, even a time share.

I'm pretty impressed and will keep it in mind. Maybe we can do something similar someday.

Check it out.
http://cgi6.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAP...sort=3&rows=25

Anything that takes thought , requires work, and results in money is good.

Jono
Lambda Chi Alpha

Its late, so my brain is getting towards E, but we used to hold events in high school, and charge for them. Whether it be a fashion show, social, fair, or whatever. For most of these kindsa things, you can ask loca businesses to donate the things you need for the event (ie, food, supplies, raffle gifts) but you have to make sure you ask in advance, because more than likely you'll have to write tothe corporate office. But just make up one of those gag-me-barf letter, that are all sugary sweet about yur org and what you're trying to get money for, and send them to any and everyone. Most places will give you stuff for free or at least at a considerable discount. Pepsi and Coca-Cola are good, as well as McDonalds and try little local places. Let them know that all advertising is free, and empahsize that LOTS of college students and their parents will be in attendence and this will help to get their name out as a partner in the community and a supporter of the youth of America (you gotta make it sound good, but don't OVER do it). Then you have your event, charge folks, and you make a big profit because your cost were little to none!!! :D

One other thing my house has tried to do is get a raffel license from the state. I don't know how it all works. but you need to be declared non-profit. then get something from sam's club (good prices) and aution it. If you get something good a local liquor store might let you raffel it there. do $2 + for a ticket.
(we got rejected, but are re applying.) good luck!
Tau Love
Lil E

wal-mart & carwashes
 

Pretty much so. I've worked at Wal-Mart since I turned 16, and did this summer for some extra cash while I was at home. A lot of the student councils in the our area had car washes, and we let them use water and hoses from the garden center. We also would give them some sort of matching donation, though I'm not sure what percentage of it we matched. Just go in to Wal-Mart and talk to a manager for more details. Wal-Mart has all sorts of programs for giving back to the community, and I think greeks should look into those programs more (something I need to bring up to our chapter when school starts...). Remember though, as madmax said, the money MUST go to a CHARITY, and not the running of the chapter. But I think most chapters wouldn't have a fundraiser for chapter operations anyway (at least I hope they wouldn't), that's what dues are for.

On the Wal-Mart thingy. Not all partcipate. In HS the one at home did, but now in Beloit, they won't do it cause of insurance issues. We begged and they refused. Not sure why some do and don't but that's been what I' ve seen.
Lil E

at UWisconsin Oshkosh we all pitched in for an all greek raffel license. The first raffel we did as the greek community was for philanthropy, but we can use it for fundraising too.