Fundraising is essential for many local and national charities, youth groups, schools and other not-for-profit organisations.  Many groups rely on the voluntary work of their members to ensure they keep going, along with the generosity of supporters to fund their existence.

Different organisations have different fundraising needs and goals, such as covering expenditure to carry out their work or working towards a specific projects they are running.

In the current economic climate, fundraising is getting harder and harder, with many cutting back on their spending, whilst they employ the “charity begins at home” policy.  This hits charities – particularly the smaller ones, fighting it out with the larger, better-known organisations – hard and so they have to find more innovative ways to gain donations, of which there are many such examples coming through, which will be highlighted in future posts.

In addition to reduced spending, there’s arguably a ‘stigma’ attached to fundraising too – in particular sponsorship of individuals for completing events, after a steep rise in such methods in recent years.  This results in numerous requests for donations or sponsorship, to which it’s often difficult to say “no” to, but unfortunately results in a dismissive view of such activities.

We must remember that fundraising is essential, but sometimes needs a bit of “thinking outside the box” to generate the desired results.  On this site, there’s lots of ideas to raise a bit of extra money for your charitable efforts.