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It might be a little late in the game to give this advice, but here I go anyway -
My chapter did Mr and Miss GU to raise money for our philanthropy. It was a huge event so we had to hold it in the main gym, so if you need a large space on campus, make sure you reserve that stuff now so you can get your dates set!
We sold advertisements for the programs that got handed out, and then we sold tickets to the event, $3 presale and $5 at the door. Each contestant had to be sponsored by a campus organization, but it didn't matter what organization (one year the commuter group put up someone for it, and his question during the question and answer portion of the event was "what do you think of the food in the cafeteria?" and his answer was "well I've never eaten there personally but I really feel like all my friends that do eat there tend to leave full!").
We have a theme every year - Wild West, Hollywood, 80s, etc., then all the contestants did a dance number to that theme, wearing costumes that they put together themselves to fit that theme.
Then there's talent, evening wear, and question and answer. Everyone had so much fun participating, we had everything from comedians to singers to dancers to a guy that smashed lightbulbs on his head (I think after that year we limited talents to things that didn't make a huge mess with shards of glass). We always have a panel of judges - someone from the charity, the greek advisor, and someone who's active with clubs on campus but is not directly affiliated with any one of them (most often someone who's affiliated with the Office of Student Development). Often we have someone from a local radio or TV station as our fourth judge, which is great because they give the event FREE PUBLICITY if they mention that they're judging the event on the air.
We have a Mr/Miss Congeniality competition where we set up jars with the contestant's pictures on them at the main desk in the campus center for people to donate all week, and then at the door you can donate more. Whoever raises the most wins.
During the final tallying of the judges' votes, one of the winners from the year before always came back and performed their talent for the crowd so that they wouldn't get bored and walk off.
Honestly, the biggest moneymakers for us were the ads in the programs - I think a full page ad was $50 and half was $25 but I'm not sure. A lot of the chapters and other organizations put ads in the programs supporting their contestant, a lot of parents put ads in congratulating their (Alpha Gam) daughters on their bids/grades/graduation/birthdays, a lot of local businesses bought ads - it was really awesome.
If you do decide to sell ads, do it soon. Often, if you can't get a business to buy an ad, they might donate something anyway or give you freebies to give to your contestants.
One year, Dominoes gave us pizza galore to give to our contestants back stage, which was really nice because we try to raise the money for the event beforehand but that allowed us to give some of our food budget right back to the philanthropy.
The other chapters on campus were our biggest supporters though, some chapters just outright gave donations, plus put up a contestant (paying a fee to be part of it if I remember correctly), plus the entire chapter would come to the event, plus they would put more money in their contestant's congeniality jars. It definitely would not have been the event it was if they didn't help us so much!
The winners often received gift certificates to local restaurants or movie theaters - most of the time those were donated by those restaurants as well!
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