Why Fundraisers with Risk Suck

So, here's the thing...

Fundraising has been beaten and bashed and overdone and chewed and spit out multiple times recently.  It's an uphill battle.

Hosting a successful school or group fundraiser is a challenge even for the best of us.  So, please don't put you, your group or your school in a position to do any of the following:

1) Fail.
2) Appear as-if you've failed.

Take a look at this quote.  I'd say this band leader feels like a failure even before the event and for good reason.  They need to sell 350 tickets to break even.  Now, that's risk.

insufficient funds for musical group fundraiser 9 Hours, 9 Minutes ago
Our group has decided to host a musical event night. We only have $1400 right now in our pto account, but group we are having costs $3,500. We are selling tickets for $10.00 a person but would need to sell at least 350 to break even. High hopes that this is going to be a great event, but how do we cover ourselves as a group if it doesn't. In the end we need to pay them $3,500. HELP!!!!!

If you are going to hold an event with this type of exposure you need to take 'fundraising' out of it.  Have your money in the account and be prepared to spend it all!  That's right... be prepared to lose your $3,500 guarantee to the band you're bringing in and then make sure everyone has an amazing time!  Then make tickets inexpensive enough to pack the room!

That's throwing a successful event!

140 tickets sold is not bad in my opinion for a live music event, but, a fundraiser should be never be like this.  If you are wondering if you're going to lose $1,600 then the fundraiser is not following the rules above.  It's either that the tickets are under-priced or the band is over-priced.  Either way, 350 attendees to break even is not a fundraiser in my book.

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Jay Moneta is the Vice President of Believe Kids Fundraising - an elementary school fundraising company with focus on heavy-hitting fall gift catalog and cookie dough fundraisers.  I appreciate comments here on my blog or at twitter.com/believekids  Thanks so much!