Fund-raising ideas urgently needed

In My Humble Opinion
1

After many years of negotiation and campaigning, my local community has finally received permission to build a new prayer facility. At the size and spec we need, total cost for the build is estimated at £500,000 to £600,000, and while we have a good number of doctors and lawyers in our midst, we’d be very hard put to raise the entire amount ourselves.

With this in mind, dear Dopers, I turn to your in you infinite and collective wisdom with a request for fundraising ideas. How is a small community of about 250 people supposed to raise that much cash? I’m not sure if bake-sales and car-washes will do it, so if you’ve been in a similar situation and had an idea which worked, please let me know about it urgently.

Thanks in advance, guys.
Bib

2

Having worked for, and now volunteer for the Make-A-Wish Foundation here in the states I am very accustomed to fundraising ideas and the like. You are in the UK right? Hmmm, I visited the Make-A-Wish in the UK back in the 90’s, it’s in Surrey, they have a mass of resources for fundraising…I’m sure you could go to the local library for more pointed resources, but off the cuff here are a few:

First and foremost Grant writing would come to mind…I’m not sure of UK practices when it comes to grant writing but I know here in the US a talented grant writer can make thousands of dollars.

Straight up fundraising is difficult…yard sales of even everyone in town proabably wouldn’t net much…do you have a timeline for when you’d like to have the money raised?

3

I’ve checked out the Make-a-Wish Foundation UK website (their offices are just down the road from me!), and they have an A-Z of fundraising ideas which looks very helpful. But what is grant writing? Can’t say I’ve ever heard of it.

With regards to timing, we’re aiming to start digging at the beginning of September, so I guess we’d need to have all the funds in place by mid-August-ish.

4

That’s a lot of cash (~$900,000 USD) in a very short period of time.

First off, I’m not in the UK, nor do I have a very good body of knowledge regarding UK non-profits and non-profit laws.

I would say that you’re not going to be breaking ground in September. It’d be a stretch to be breaking ground next August, given the small number of constituents that you have.

Raising money for new structures usually entails a capital campaign. Capital campaigns usually run the course between three to six years, usually four or five. Typical custom is to have at least 30% of your target amount raised before you even officially start a campaign - that’s ~$270,000 USD, in hand.

Here in the US, you’d have to primarily depend on individual donors for your money. Corporations are a hard sell for religious giving, especially if they’re not currently regular donors. Grant seeking would be another option, but like Phlsphr said, I’m not acquainted with their prevalence in the UK. Here, there’s a foundation for everything. With a good writer, or a good grant consultant (boo, hiss!), you could probably count on about $50,000-$75,000 tops. The majority of grants top out at about $10,000. But even being able to get rid of 10% of your total is a great start from foundations.

40% of the total should be coming from top donors. You probably have a pretty good idea of who those people are going to be. Your top donor should also be spearheading this campaign. Nobody can raise more money than the person who individually donated the largest chunk. Does your organization have a Board of Directors? They should be extremely involved, each of them needs to have given a sizeable* donation.

*Sizeable: Board members should be donating yearly anyways. It should be clear that there is an expectation of this, and that “sizeable” means an amount that is significant to them. $1,000 is nothing to someone who makes $200,000 a year, but is an extremely significant amount to someone who makes $25,000.

You’re also going to be tempted to put on one or two extravagent affairs to raise money. Please do so. But also be aware that fundraiser events have a terrible track record of actually raising funds. What you gain by these events is awareness of your need, as well as a mailing list, and hopefully a good number of pledges. If you don’t make 30 phone calls the day after a fundraiser, you’ve lost money.

Wow, that’s a jumble.

  1. Set a timeline.
  2. Get a handful of top donors.
  3. Put one of those top donors in charge.
  4. Get money from your Board members. Make it clear if it hasn’t been clarified before that giving is expected (and is most likely required in the by-laws).
  5. Get a grant writer.
  6. Start asking!