Can't raise the money

[MyLitespeed]

I would love to go on more charity rides but no one wants to donate any money. The last ride I did was the Tour de Cure in San Diego and I was asking people and they would just ignore me or say they forgot. I would even tell them $1.00 would help -- they wouldn't even donate that. Don't know if people are just tighter with their money here or what. I get the idea that they expect something in return--like cookies or something. All the people at work have no problem asking me to buy Girl Scout Cookies for their kids or buy other stuff for their kids schools. Since they won't donate to me I have quit buying their kids stuff.

[KnottedYet]

Cookies might be a cool idea. You could make bike-shaped sugar cookies, and do them up with icing (spokes and other details) and sell them for donations.

I've seen bike-shaped pasta. Maybe you could hold a little silent auction for a pasta salad made with bike pasta for donation $$.

Of course, I'm hungry.... so all my fundraising ideas at the moment involve food!

[Trek420]

oooh, cookies

Lots of good ideas from TE'ers here

http://forums.teamestrogen.com/showthread.php?t=10141

[pooks]

You said "more" charity rides. Are these people who have donated before and don't want to again?

Maybe it's just too soon to ask again?

[mimitabby]

I went to See's chocolates and bought 25 candy bars. I sold them for 2 dollars a piece. Two people gave me extra money!

I sold them in 2 days. If I had started earlier, I could have sold a lot more.


and post a link to your fundraiser here; people donated to mine from TE!

[pooks]

Oh, that's smart!

When one of my sons wanted to have a lemonade stand, i told him, "Too messy and not enough people will stop." Instead, I told him to sell canned Cokes. He would go to 7-11, buy a box of cold Cokes, then sit on the corner and sell them. Sometimes he'd sell two or three boxes in a a couple of hours. People are leery of homeade lemonade but are often quite eager to have a coke, and even at a markup, they were getting the cans cheaper than they'd get a fountain drink at a drive-thru. He would vary the types of drinks, of course, but Coke always sold the best.

He did that for a couple of summers, whenever he wanted money.

So buy something they would want but might not be convenient for them to get right then, and mark it up for charity. Excellent idea, Mimi!

[quint41]

I'm fortunate to work with a lot of very generous people. However, many of us are parents, and it's incredible how many kid fundraisers are brought into the office. You can really go broke on these things. My own daughter had a recent fundraiser -- a cinnamon pull-apart breakfast bread cost $16!! Hello! I could have bought something similar at the local supermarket for $3.99! Of course, everyone tries to support everyone else, but you can't possibly do everything or you WILL go broke!

I find that a charity ride allows you to appeal to a different side of people. This is what I did for the MS Bike Tour that's coming up:

First, I tweaked my personal web page for the MS Tour, didn't just used the canned verbage they suggested. I told how my uncle had MS, and I can remember visiting him when I was little. I mentioned that I also know three other people with MS, one is only in her 20's. It could be any of us, or our children, diagnosed next. We can receive e-mail on phones small enough to slip into the tightest pocket, but we cannot find a cure for MS? I find this unacceptable! I then printed off a few copies of my personal web page, which has my picture on it, in color. I posted those on bulletin boards around the office with little slips of paper containing the web address of where people could go to support me. I also put the little contribution cards that MS Society sent me pinned around the web page.

On my web page, I said that I am definitely riding 50 K ... but with enough support from my friends and family, I will push myself to ride 100 K. That REALLY got people. All of a sudden, I have people who are just astounded that I can ride 31 miles, never mind 62 miles. And I'm getting donations.

This was very long-winded, but sometimes you just have to appeal to people in a different way.

Good luck!