I've got a GFA place for next year and want to run for a charity on my terms - i.e. raise what I can, without commiting to £1500+ sponsership.
The company I work for has 2 nominated charities which they support so I approached the fund raising committee to say I interested in running for one of these charities. I was told that I would still need to raise £1000 to run for them although I wouldn't have to pay the £100 registration as I had my own place !!!
Isn't that a bit of a cheek ? Aren't I doing them the favour by raising money for them - and then they still demand a minimum amount ! I'm not looking for a free mountain bike or a pasta party, I simply want to raise money for a good cause, without the pressure of a minimum amount.
Or is this just the way charities work ?
I've run for Unicef before and they were just happy to get what I had raised.
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just do your own sponsorship then, and give them the monety after
they wont say no
this is one of the reasons I stopped raising funds for charities at races
it seemed the more you gave the more they wanted
so just run for myself know
evening PH
i do see your point
choose a different charity. If you go ahead and run for this charity, and raise their minimum amount then all you are doing is supporting their system.
youve said you dont need anything else
dont do it officially
Speak to someone else there - maybe its run by volunteers and not professionals.
The next time I ran for a really small local charity. I could see the difference the money made with my own eyes and there was genuine gratitude for the effort that went in.
Now I don't expect a parade and a brass band but raising a couple of grand is bloody hard work and a thank you would be nice. Trouble is that the big charities are big business now, raising millions from hundreds of thousands of people and we're all just cogs in a big machine. I personaly won't raise money for a "corporate" charity again.
unfortunately then that means that there's a bit less money to go round for small, local, or volunteer-run charities, and when you do do something voluntary then people tend to assume you are getting paid for it so give less - i'm a trustee of a small volunteer-run charity & when i do things like standing around in the street with buckets then more & more people will ask 'are you being paid for this' first, or just won't give at all.
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if you're interested in running to finish off a badly-needed children's outpatent's department for a psychatric hospital in Calcutta (the only one accessible to most of West Bengal), please drop me an email - 100% volunteer-run, no freebies, but lots of encouragement from an enthusiastic committee with both very serious & 'fun' runners.
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Does anyone know how justgiving works - do you set it up yourself or does the charity do it up for you, and if so would smaller, non-corporate charities be able to ?
but
the site does charge the charity for its services-so not all the little charities use it
I will only fundraise once a year(and get sick of ppeole asking me with every mara who i am raisng money for)
and yes, most of my regular stuff is via standing order
Jj, I too have a lot of sympathy with your attitude. I tend to keep a small 'kitty' (not a leopard!) for ad hoc donations but also have some on standing order.
Although I had a GB place for FLM this year, I did promise my friends and family that this would be a 'one off' event.
Since '05 Wateraid have invited me to be in their FLM team and I'm sure a minimum amount would apply. I would love to run FLM again but know I would struggle to raise much above £500 so for the benefit of the charity I have decided to let other people haver their places.
FLM is a really big fundraising event for charities, and they have to make the most of it. I know during mile 1 of the race I realised that's what it's all about really - the crowds that support you all the way along feel good because of the good causes - not my PB!
What they should have though, is a different package available to people wanting to fundraise off their own backs. They could have gotten, say, £300 from your efforts but thanks to their greed have ended up with nothing. People are obviously going to tell them to get stuffed so I don't see how that is good fundraising practice.
What I would advise all people with their own place to do is to avoid big national charities. These get enough money as it is on marathon day. It really annoys me at the FLM and GNR to see people raising thousands of pounds from their local communities, only to give the money to the national headquarters of the big charities. I'd rather see more people running for causes which they know will benefit the communities of the people donating the funds rather than going to the same 33 charities everyone else is supporting.
If you contact your local Council for Voluntary Service (ww.nacvs.org.uk will help you find it) they will be able to advise you on numerous charities in your area who your money will make a massive difference to. They will organise a lot of media work, fundraising and other activities off the back of your efforts and make you feel very special.
The charity I ran my first GNR for raised nearly as much money as I did from their own activities surrounding my participation. That meant a lot more to me than merely giving them a cheque and being just another number on a database for them.
Depends whether your charity is registered with it. The problem with JG is that they charge you a flat-rate fee regardless of how many sponsorship pages you have (and then take a % from donations on top of that), so it's not so cost-effective if you only have a few people doing events every year (that's why Antara doesn't have JG).
Don't forget, if you are raising funds for a golden bond place, the first £250 goes to buy a place for you, not to the charity. It's still better for the individual charity to have some funds raised that way rather than none at all, but it does reduce the 'pool' of money around for all charities - so little ones get increasingly squeezed out.
Roobarb - thanks, we already have 'VOLUNTEER' badges, but a lot of people won't see those.
If you are considering which charity to raise funds for - some find it easier to recruit people than others. Overseas charities (without a local connection), and mental health tend to loose out to fluffy animals & cute small children.
If you can, then volunteering directly for the charity can do as much if not more good than fundraising or giving money. If you approach a charity you are interested in with a bit about what you are good at / interested in, then you might be able to be a lot of help for a few hours a month or a one-off project - we've recently had someone write us some proper accounting spreadsheets & a database which has made life a lot easier, and there's people all over the country who write letters to the patients in India which are apparently very enthusiastically recieved - doesn't take more than a few hours a year but seems to make a lot of difference.
They would be happy to have you run for them I am sure and you wont be expected to give a set amount
I've made a charity application to Cancer Research but I've applied through BHF as well just in case. Might sound a bit cynical, but I know Cancer Research are oversubscribed for Golden Bond places and BHF should take my previous fund raising efforts into account.
This year they have already offered me a guaranteed golden bond place which I have accepted mainly due to how fab they have been in the past.
So, not all the biggies are the same.
I did write to Breastcancer breakthrough once and got a letter telling me it was a "2500 minumum - lord above!!!!!!!!!!
how much did you end up riaising for them
Just to let you know that I ran FLM for Scope last year on a Gold Bond place as my little boy Riley has severe cerebral palsy. My mate was in via the ballot and also ran for them. He made no commitment to raising any particular amount but they still treated him the same as me: free singlet, post-race massage, information pack, pre-race support etc. In short, very helpful - I'd run for them again but have a Whizz-kidz Gold Bond place this year.
LoR
http://www.justgiving.com/lifeofriley
Sorry but I don't know how to do the hyperlink thingy so you'll have to cut and paste!
LoR
LoR