|
This is way late, but it might still help.
In California, raffles are illegal unless conducted as a donation (California Penal Code 319). Basically a "raffle" contains 3 elements:
1) Consideration (i.e. Paying money for a ticket)
2) Chance
3) Prize
To make it legal, you must remove at least one element. The easiest way to do this is to remove consideration; like sairose said in an earlier post, if you sell something tangible (food, entry to a dance, etc.) and the raffle ticket comes with it, then it's legal. The only drawback is that if someone comes to you and says they want a raffle ticket but don't want to purchase anything to get it, you're obligated by law to give it to them. It's the whole sweepstakes idea that there's "no purchase necessary to participate." Most people don't really know that raffles are illegal and that requesting a ticket is an option.
You can also take away the chance element, but basically everyone has to win/receive something if you do that. Example: you pass out chocolate bars at the entry to an event and the inside of the paper wrapping has a discount coupon or tells if you're an "instant winner." This would be ok because either way, you win the prize of the chocolate bar, but you may also win an additional prize. Radio stations and department stores do this all the time.
Kind of pointless to take the prize element away...
|
Threaded Mode