Red Cross Blogs

Quills at the ready

By Katrina Crew
September 8, 2009 at 10:40 am

If you’re like me, the idea of running a marathon is something akin to being tarred and feathered. Jumping out of a plane sounds even worse.

So when friends and family tell me they’re taking on one of our fundraising challenges, I’m usually more than happy to dig into my pocket and support them because the main thought in my head is “Better you than me.”

This weekend, though, I found a fundraising challenge that actually inspired me. Unleash Your Story is for people who love to read and write. It was started by some romance novelists in the US who explain: “Besides our love of romance, writing and chocolate we also have a common interest in supporting our community.”

They came up with the idea of having a month-long read-a-thon and write-a-thon. Throughout September, people will be setting their own goals — how many pages they will read that month, or how many words they’ll write, and how much money they’ll raise. The funds go to the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation in the US, and they’re hoping to raise $23,000 this year. You can work in teams or individually, and there are prizes to be won (which, unfortunately, are not shipped overseas). You don’t have to read and write romance; one of the participants has pledged to write 10,000 words in blog comments!

What I love about this idea is that it’s encouraging people to raise money by doing things they love to do anyway. Apparently last year one husband pledged $100 to his wife. He gave the first $50 at the beginning of the month and told her he’d give the last $50 when she met her target.

No running. No sweating. No heaving.

It made me wonder what other fundraising ideas you can come up with to encourage people to raise money while doing something they love to do anyway. Any ideas?

Image copyright asafesh/stock.xchng

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Tags: charity events, events, fundraising, fundraising ideas, sponsored events, sponsorship

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 8th, 2009 at 10:40 am and is filed under Fundraising and events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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