Planning Your Activity

Theme ideas

• Themed balls – masquerade, glitzy, black and white, James Bond 007, Shakespeare
• Quiz Nights – Christmas, Easter, Bonfire night, local knowledge, top tens, world records
• Food events – World cuisine, Victorian, Medieval banquet, bangers and mash, chocolate
• Sponsored events – sing, dancing, cake bake, slim, silence, fire-walking, swim, cycle, run

Objectives and budget

Once you have decided the type of event you would like to organise, it’s time to start planning. How much would you like to raise, after expenses – set a challenging but realistic target.

Set a simple budget:

• Income
• Ticket price
• Raffle/stalls
• Refreshments
• Donations
• Gifts in kind
• Corporate Sponsorship
• Expenditure
• Printing and advertising
• Catering
• Postage
• Prizes/incentives
• Hire Fees

Create a list of things to do before, during and after the event and a timetable for doing them.

How many people do you need to attract to raise a healthy profit?

Can you recover some of the costs through sponsorship, donations or gifts in kind from local businesses such as prizes, printing or refreshments.

Date and venue

To make it easy for people to take part, avoid choosing a date that may clash with other major fundraising events.

When choosing your venue, book well in advance and consider the following:

• Cost of hire – always negotiate for free hire
• Access and safety
• Availability of facilities and equipment , i.e. catering and toilets
• Car parking and local public transport
• Tables, chairs and power points
• Disabled access
• Are you able to put up decorations or display material?
• Does the venue have an alcohol licence?
• Are you able to access venue early in the day or the day before and is this included in the price?
• Ensure you have the following:
• Written confirmation of booking and check cancellation clauses
• Check the venue’s fire regulations and insurance cover

Promotion and publicity

Targeting – Think about who your event will appeal to so that you can target your publicity materials well in advance in appropriate places such as local pubs and clubs.

Publicity material and media coverage – Ask us for help with professional material and press releases.

Personal invitations – These are more effective than simply displaying a poster. Ask friends, family and work colleagues to help promote your event among their contacts.

Help from us

Don’t forget to tell us what you are doing. We can help in many ways, not only as mentioned above with publicity materials and media coverage, but also with supplying collection boxes, stickers, t-shirts and sponsor forms. Contact the Fundraising Team on 01689 825755.

Pricing and selling tickets

Setting ticket prices can be tricky. To help you decide, compare prices of other similar events, think of what you need to buy, what has been donated, and if selling goods, how much they cost to buy or make. Selling tickets in advance means you can plan for you event more confidently.

Hints and tips

• Talk through what kitchen facilities your caterers or volunteers will need
• Make sure you have enough equipment, i.e. pens and paper for a quiz
• Do you need signage to direct people to and around event?
• If the event requires it, ensure you have informed the local police and/or relevant local authorities
• Get family and friends on board well in advance and spread out the tasks so no-one feels overburdened
• If physical exertion is involved, offer participants unlimited water to prevent dehydration, but you could sell soft drinks and snacks
• Organise the lighting to give your event the right atmosphere

Fundraising Online

More and more people when taking part in or organising their own event are using online fundraising methods. To make this option simpler for you we have teamed up with Virgin Money Giving offering a secure and easy way for you way for you to raise money.

With Virgin Money Giving you can create your own fundraising page making it unique to you and your event. For example, you can add your own pictures and paragraph detailing what the event is and why you are doing it. Once this has been completed the link can then be sent to friends, family and colleagues asking them to support you by donating online. It is great for them because it can be done quickly and securely, and also great for you because you can benefit from the gift aid scheme, adding 25% to the value of their donation.

Just ask us for more details, hints and advice about how to do this, alternatively we can set up your fundraising page for you.

Assessing risks

What people tend to remember about your event is those special extra’s (see below) and unfortunately anything that goes wrong. While some events involve more risks than others, by doing a risk assessment you can identify what could harm people and how you can prevent that happening. Things to consider:

• Hazards – list what could go wrong at each stage and list everything that could cause harm
• Who might be harmed and how badly?
• Severity and likelihood of hazard
• Control measures – steps taken to reduce risk
• Further action – decide on any new controls that are needed to reduce risks
• Ask us for an example Risk Assessment

Special Extras

• If serving food and drink, add a twist to the title, such as ‘Wine and Wisdom’ at a quiz event
• Prizes for Best Dressed, Best Team Name or something appropriate for your event
• Sell accessories to add value to themed events, such as sparkle bow ties for a glitzy ball
• Hold an auction or raffle, or both!
• Employ an artist to do caricatures, or face-painter for children’s events, with a share of the profits

Post Event

• Ensure you write thank you letters to anyone who contributed to the event, and if appropriate let them know how much was raised
• Let us know how it went and if you have any photos do send them to us because we may be able to use them for our Newsletter and website

Event checklist

Make sure you have…

planned the day by:

• deciding on an event and theme
• choosing a date and venue (considering the facilities you need)
• producing a budget – identifying expenses and the total to be raised
• drawing up a list of things to do and a timetable for doing them, plus a contacts list
• recruiting helpers – giving each a task, for example, selling tickets
• contacting local businesses for gifts in kind and donations

publicised the event through:

• promotional materials (contact us for help with these)
• friends and family
• appropriate locations, for example, a sponsored swim at local pools and fitness centres
• local schools, churches and community organisations
• the local media (contact us for help with this)

prepared for the event, considering:

• what will appeal to local people
• the venue and access to facilities
• sponsorship levels and registration fees
• equipment and signage
• refreshments
• help needed on the day
• any risks
• special extra’s

If you have covered all eventualities, then you’re ready for the big day.