Office Fundraiser Ideas

When you're in charge of your office's fundraiser, you've got two goals to meet:

1. Raise the amount of money you've been assigned.
2. Not make your co-workers dread the sight of you.

Your campaign needs to be fun and engaging, but also effective. Here are a handful of ideas to get you started:

In her article, 10 Fun and Great Fund-Raising Ideas for Your Workplace, Josienita Borlongan says that having a Pink Ballerina Hippo Costume Fund-Raising Contest has been very successful for her. Co-workers vote with their dollars for the person in the office that they would most like to wear a pink ballerina hippo costume.

This idea sounds a bit mean to me, but it does remind me of when Beth Kanter wrote about Sarah Bunting of Tomato Nation raising over $100,000 for DonorsChoose. Sarah promised her blog's readers that she would go to work (at Rockefeller Center in New York City) wearing a tomato costume if they would collectively donate $40,000 dollars. You can watch the video of her in the costume on YouTube.

The United Way of Will County has a long list of office fundraising ideas including:

• Auction off an executive doing the winner's job for one hour.
• Have staff members prepare delicious lunches to be auctioned off to co-workers.

BNET also has a long list in its article, Ideas for Office Fun(d)raising. My favorites were:

• Raffle a day off of work.
• Charge an entry fee for a Nerf hoops competition.

The article also suggests that a moustache-wearing staff member volunteer to shave his moustache off if the office reaches its fundraising goal.

In the opposite approach, the Online Fundraising Blog's post, Fundraisers Ready Razors for End of Moustache May, describes how men raise money by growing (or not shaving) their moustaches.

What are some of the creative ideas you've used to get your co-workers excited to donate?

Flickr photo credit: Bake Sale uploaded by theotherway / Michelle


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