Fundraising Ideas?

[rabbitsmba]

Hi All,

I was just wondering if anyone had any tried and true fundraising ideas?  My husband and I volunteer for Rabbit Rescue in Ontario, Canada and we’re trying to figure out fun ways to raise money.  We’ve done garage sales, silent auctions, chocolate sales and raffles, but we’d like to try something a bit bigger and different.

Care to share some ideas?

[osprey]

We did a “Boozing for Bunnies” event at The Rabbit Haven.  A volunteer rented out a club and sold drink tickets.  Most of the attendees were her friends, but it was basically an excuse to throw a party and The Haven made a few hundred dollars from it.

Red Door in Chicago has a “Spa Day” where folks bring their bunnies for nail trims, grooming, photo shoots and other fun stuff.  I think this is a fund raiser for them.

We are doing a Bunnyfest again this year.  It is a show for vendors to sell bunny themed merchandise and there are adoptions from rescues as well as workshops with local vets and rescue people.  I am not too involved with it, but I think we make money from the vendors and by selling admission tickets.

Have you guys looked at grants at all?  Oxbow, BuildABear, PetsMart and many others have programs where they will sponsor education, spay/neuter, etc.

 

[Sarita]

We also had one of our volunteers do a party at a club for our rescue, North Texas Rabbit Sanctuary and it was very successful and the nice thing was that she did all the work since it’s usually the board members doing this and it reached alot of people other than our members. It was a great event.

We also do our spa day, Elizabeth Ardbun – we groom the rabbits, do their nails, sell products, different things like that – you do have to find a venue that allows animals though. Charge a cover fee per family.

Our most successful thoug is our basket raffle which our president bascially puts together all the baskets and they are gorgeous – try to get as many donations as possible for this though – also our president loves to shop and gets bargains. Board members also make contributions. We charge $1 per raffle ticket. We made I think $3000 this year on this – you do only want to do this for local people though as shipping can be too expensive. The baskets are HUGE and full of wonderful stuff. Our most successful this year was the “Dining Out” basket with gift certificates to local restaurants and grocery stores. We also did a “Bunny Lovers Basket”, “Wine Basket” (must be 21 years old to get tickets for this), “Dining In” basket (full of food items and kitchen items), “Pamper Yourself” basket (full of spa, skincare, bodycare, etc items), Ipod basket (we had someone donate an Ipod to us, very lucky for us), golfers dream (almost all donated items), Starbuck Lovers basket.

[Sarita]

http://ntrs.org/index.html

Here’s a link, look under raffle winners.

Is your rabbit rescue a foster system or an actual facility?  We do about 3 Open Houses a year too where we sell rabbit related items and show off our santuary rabbits (we do ziptie the cages though so people cannot just get our rabbits in and out without our supervision). 

[JK]

What about putting on a like a black and white ball? The schools here do things like this and make quite a bit of money. You could have a silent auction too with all items being donated. That’s what I’d like to do for Save a Bunny. Tickets could be $75 – $100 and hopefully a couple hundred people would attend.

[Kokaneeandkahlua]

Ohhh those are all good ideas guys!!

I’ll think on it and get back to you rabbitsmba! I know people like to gamble, maybe a lotto for donated items? They’d have to be big ticket items like tv’s etc, but that might work. I’ll keep thinking!

[Sage Cat]

I have always wanted to have a cocktail party with a silent action. I should talk to my shelter about that!

The only Open Houses I have been to are free to get in – but then people can buy merchandise. I donated a bunch of food to one for a Wild Animal Rescue in Boulder – the food was given out free – a good way to get people to come in.

I think Texas-Hold-Um is still popular enough that you could try that.

The Basket idea is great – it is amazing what business will donate if you just ask!

I love the bunny Spa Day idea.

[kimberleyanddarren]

how about a Cutest Bunny Contest? It could be done online so everyone can enter not just those in the local area, it would be easy to set up a free site (maybe BB might even help you out with some html tips?!) if you charged say $10 or $20 dollars and gave the winner a donated bottle of champagne or something like that? This way it would be all about the bunnies, would be fun, could include hundreds of people from across the world and would certainly raise alot of money!!

OMG i want to enter already! lol

[rabbitsmba]

Wow, these are all really fun ideas! Thanks for the help!

We aren’t an actual facility but rather a series of foster homes throughout the province. And we have applied for every grant that exists – and we have received many as well! But we don’t always want to rely on grants and some of them have limitations as well.

Mostly our problem is that our members are spread out so far, it’s hard for everyone to get together. We just tried organizing a comedy night in Toronto, but we haven’t had a lot of interest. It’s just too difficult for people to come out – it is a 1-2 hour drive for a lot of them.

We’ve never really done anything BIG before, but we want to. I guess we just need to go out there and try something new! I love the idea of a Black and White ball and silent auction. And the bunny spa is great too!

Thanks for the inspiration and keep the ideas coming!

[Kokaneeandkahlua]

I love that idea kimberlyanddarren!!! Very original!!

[RabbitPam]

If they’re spread out maybe you need a fundraiser via the mail. (My first suggestion was to do an auction, but that’s hard to organize.) Do you already send out the basic requests for donations to all your members?

You could have a T-shirt design contest where the members can send in designs or photos with an entrance fee ($5 or so) by a certain deadline, then you choose the winner. Then have them printed up with the proceeds in bulk, (like all size Large) and sell them by mail order. If they cost $2 a shirt to make sell them for $10 – something like that.

[KatnipCrzy]

I love the t-shirt idea- especially if you have a great design that bunny lovers “must have”. 

Also raffles can really be the way to go with trying to get most of the items donated- our saltwater fish club send out letters at the end of the year to companies to be considered for the next year’s “charitable donations”.  They donate and ship items to us- that we sell tickets for at our annual frag swap.  It promotes their products and we made $2500 off the raffle alone last year.

Since you are not in a set location- it would be best to have it as an online raffle to buy tickets- but even then I think there are rules and regulations and shipping might be a nightmare- cost, insurance, shipping out of country- Canada, US, etc.

So that leads me back to the t-shirt idea really- if you get a great design that house bunny lovers adore and don’t make it TOO specific to your organization- you will have sales.  (For example-  you could have a small logo for your rescue- but don’t have that as main design as it does not mean as much to someone in Michigan).

Do something catchy and funny like a “defintinion”

House rabbits: when unsuspecting people bring fuzzy little bunnies into their home, and the next thing you know you are buying more veggies than ever before, learning what a “binky” is, and doing anything to avoid the stink eye!

 a to do list:  buy veggies (selecting the freshest), wash veggies, arrange salad, offer to bunny, clean cage, give cuddles, enjoy resulting binkies.

So either a catchy phrase, definition, etc  or some really great artwork will MAKE a t-shirt!

[RabbitPam]

Also tote bags are useful and only come in one size, with the design on it. I like the addition of funny/cute sayings. Maybe short ones like
“I’m a Bunny Slave”
or
“I Binkie for Bananas” or “Hay, Timothy! No, it’s Timothy Hay!” Stuff like that. With adorable pix or design above it of course.

I have to admit it’s not an original idea: I once won a design contest for Mothers of Multiples, and my design went onto a tote. Also, when I went to donate to the Humane Society, I saw their T-shirts on line with the bunny on it. Irresistible, and now I sleep in my T.

[Hedi]

What about setting up something on cafepress if you do the Tshirt logo design idea? I have bought all kinds of stuff from there from different rescues just because I liked the sayings on them. I have a license plate holder from a rescue that says “Put some hop into your life, adopted a homeless rabbit.”
I just love that. And license plate holders are fun and failry cheap.

[kimberleyanddarren]

i know i was excited writing it K&K i was omg i want hopscotch in a beauty pagent! lol

[jpgood]

how about a murder mystery dinner play. We just went to one they had 2 acts and then the third act you sold clues to the audience for 1 dollar. THey had food donations so that didn’t cost too much. I bet they made a lot of money at the one I went to. 10 dollars a ticket and lots of people were there and everyone bought at least 5-6 clues.

[RabbitPam]

Another idea after I logged off earlier:
What about Ebay? Can you get your members to donate items for sale on Ebay with the proceeds going to your Rescue? There are people who are Ebay handlers, who will accept stuff (could be shipped to them) and do the whole selling process for you. Fee based I’m sure, but might not cut into your profits from the sale.
If you do sell anything like the shirts, you can sell those on Ebay too.

[Gravehearted]

oo lots of great ideas! 🙂

[Author]

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