How Charities Raise Funds In The UK
There are so many charities all competing to raise money for their worthy cause that they are having to think of more and more ideas for innovative charity fundraising.
Things like the National Lotteries, Children in Need and other television telethons have detracted from the smaller charities desperately trying to get funds.
One of the best and easiest way they have found to raise a huge amount of money in a very short time is by gaining sponsorship through sporting events. Worldwide marathons like London, New York, Boston and others are given a certain number of Gold Bond places they can give away to runners willing to raise funds for them.
This benefits both the runners and the charity, the runners do not have to pay the hefty entry fee which rises every year as the events cost more and more to stage. The charities set a limit the runners have to agree to raise before they are given the place and in one day they can get in more than they took to raise in a year through bag packing, coffee mornings, flag days and other local events.
Another way charities raise a large amount of money is by offering adventure holidays in return for sponsorship. These can include trekking across Nepal or climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. Participants have to agree to pay their own expenses to get there, which they usually fundraise for individually, and are then sponsored for completing the task.
This offers them one of the most exciting and challenging experiences in their life and the chance to meet new friends, whilst the charity will raise much-needed funds.
Children in Need with their famous Pudsey Bear is one of the leading television fundraising events of the year. Taking place annually in the UK in November to raise money for children at home and abroad every year it breaks the record with millions of pounds being raised.
Bob Geldof has worked tirelessly to raise funds for Africa and his Run the World was one of the most innovative events ever held and started a lot of people off on their fun-running career and inspired them to combine this with charity fundraising.
At the same time all over the world based on Greenwich Mean Time people set off on a 1 mile or 6 mile course to raise money for Africa and hordes of people entered knowing that hundreds of miles away across the oceans people were doing the same thing. This was followed by the highly successful Band Aid concert.
People still carry buckets and hold tombolas and coffee mornings for various charities, but it is the big events that are the key to successful charity fundraising.
