sponsers

[sirbleedsalot]

I was wondering how many teams out there had commercial sponsers that donate more than 1000 dolars to your team.
And how you get those big sponsers

[ngreen]

We have 5 commercial sponsor over 1,000, plus 3 foundations over a thousand and the NASA KSGC 10000 grant.

Not all these are donations of money over a thousand. One lets us use a building with utilities for free, another is for both mentor time (figured out to be several thousand for one mentor), and one is the matching program from Wal-mart(we raised a thousand through a raffle and they matched it last year), not sure about this year (thought matching was a one time offer).

Mostly we just ask and get our name out there. That is the best I see. We send letters to business and make phone calls and visits if needed. We also try to take advantage of any parent with connection to a business. Making your team known by making a contact in your local paper can be good. A team member writes a weekly article in our paper during the build season about our progress.

Because I mention a couple 1000 + sponsors I'll mention them all so they get equal coverage (KSGC/NASA, Baehr Foundation, Knights of Columbus, Electric Shop, Inc., Sutherland Family Limited Partnership, Team Bank, N.A., Wal-mart(Paola, KS), Roman Foundation, Kauffman Foundation (Also helping with 2005 KC regional), ABC Productions, Inc., Devry University).

[jonathan lall]

I just finished answering a similar question on Woburn's Ask188 system a couple hours ago for another team, and we've gotten a few sponsorship questions before through Ask188. Here's the text of that response; I hope it's helpful. If anyone has further questions about our team, ask away. Sorry, I won't (and can't) give any more info about our sponsors' contributions than i have in this quote, because money issues are really between them and us. Also, note that all figures are $CDN, and that I am addressing someone from a Canadian team.

Originally Posted by Ask188 Response: Jonathan Lall

Well, there are a few approaches that can be taken. The first step would probably be to ascertain whether any team members (or even friends of team members) have connections. If you look at our website's Sponsors section, you will see that we have a large number of sponsors. The truth is, that only four give more than $1000 to us. Still, little community businesses will offer up some money if you have connections, and it adds up. Sometimes if you pester one company a lot, they will give you some relatively small sum, though one must be careful and civil about that. I cannot stress how important it is to let them see what FIRST is all about, and how it can benefit the kids and even benefit their company. Here's an excerpt from our website:

We're glad you've shown interest in sponsoring our team; thank you for that! Now let me take a moment to explain what is involved and why your company's support is so worthwhile. What we have found when speaking to corporations and businesses, is that they are led to believe all we need is funding, or that when we ask for their support we are always looking for a monetary donation. This could not be farther from the truth. While monetary sponsorship is always appreciated and is the largest and most important part of our sponsorship program, our team can also benefit from materials, facilities, or mentorship from a company engineer; if your company for whatever reason cannot provide monetary support to our team, please consider helping us in other ways. The possibilities are nothing short of endless.

And that's the thing about this program. FIRST is the epitome of applied education theories. Not only does it involve building a 130-pound $3000 robot, travelling the continent, and competing in the name of our sponsors, but it teaches students programming, business, and leadership skills like nothing else offered at the high school level. These are skills that invariably prove valuable after high school, and in the workplace. Worldwide, there are nearly 1000 teams in the program, and Dean Kamen's resolve to "change the culture" of America is only becoming stronger.

Businesses are recognizing that FIRST students are intelligent and resourceful, which is why many put so much time, funds, and effort into cultivating them into the leaders of tomorrow. Woburn Robotics can benefit from your support. I implore you to invest in the future.


-Jonathan Lall, President

When contacting prospective sponsors, try to get a face to face meeting. Show them [your] website, and show how prominently you feature their names. Maybe give them a token to remember you by. If you're presenting to big corporate fish that might give you a load of money, consider a robot demonstration or a video! We invested this year in having our sponsors' names printed on our jerseys. Name placement is often important to businesses if the "helping kids" card doesn't completely win them over. You can also introduce a hierarchy (i.e. "Gold" and "Silver" level sponsors) with increased rewards, but that is your decision; it works for some and the advantage to that is that it intices sponsors to donate more money to get to the next level. The disadvantage is that it can reduce the status of sponsor from 'valued supporter' to 'money granter'.

Finding big sponsors is not easy. This year, because we could find none, we ended up going for a lot of small ones. It worked. If you cannot find large corporations or related businesses in your area, consider going to small places, even franchises. Also consider in-school sales and events such as carwashes (though I personally would not go that way). Most importantly, have one or two people senior or soon to be senior on the team in charge of this. They are responsible and accountable. Throughout build season, consider a thank-you letter or two with a progress report. Invite them to see what's going on. The end result of a good sponsorship campaign is money left over from the last season and no stinginess during the season (and also a renewed commitment from that year's sponsors for the next year). In all honesty, we have not done this perfectly (Woburn Robotics is stingy), but we are still in good shape.

If you have any more questions, you can email me or post in our forum. Good luck!

Oh, one more thing: here's our Sponsors page.

[Alex Cormier]

team 1126 from rochester, new york has only one SPONSOR XEROX! but he have supposrters... we get well over 1,000 from xerox im thinking 10 times that.... good luck to all... they came to our school looking to make a team.

[Shawn60]

We had 19 different companies donate money, materials, or supplies that we valued over $500. Of those the following amounts over $1,000 were

$24,000 - Ford Motor Company
$20,000 - time and materials Laron Incorporated
$4,000 - Southwire
$2,000 - West Cost Netting
$1,000 - H and H Printers, Timken, Bearing Belt Chain, I-Corp Arizona, Brackett Aircraft, Repo Depot, Gear Up,

We have a marketing plan that we put together. It has taken us about 5 years to reach this level of success. If you want to find the marketing plan you can download it form our web site at www.team60.com. If you want any other help just e-mail me and we will help any way we can.

Shawn
Team 60

[Collin Fultz]

Originally Posted by sirbleedsalot

I was wondering how many teams out there had commercial sponsers that donate more than 1000 dolars to your team.
And how you get those big sponsers

don't take this as a bash...however...a "sponser" is probably looking for a team who can spell "sponser" (SPONSOR)

businesses are business like. if you want a business to sponsor your team, your must portray yourself in a business-like manner...especially when first approaching them. don't forget the little things...shirts tucked in, hair looking nice and combed (a lot of times the money has to come from somebody older than your parents and odds are he doens't want to see a 'fro), etc. have things planned out and things ready to hand out. have concrete examples of how your team impacts it's students, other students, and the community...but most of all...please...spell sponsor correctly

of course...i guess that is why God invented spell check.

[Ryan F.]

Originally Posted by Shawn60

We had 19 different companies donate money, materials, or supplies that we valued over $500. Of those the following amounts over $1,000 were

$24,000 - Ford Motor Company
$20,000 - time and materials Laron Incorporated
$4,000 - Southwire
$2,000 - West Cost Netting
$1,000 - H and H Printers, Timken, Bearing Belt Chain, I-Corp Arizona, Brackett Aircraft, Repo Depot, Gear Up,

We have a marketing plan that we put together. It has taken us about 5 years to reach this level of success. If you want to find the marketing plan you can download it form our web site at www.team60.com. If you want any other help just e-mail me and we will help any way we can.

Shawn
Team 60

Wow...I can only dream of our team being sponsored like that. The thing I've always wondered is what do you do with all that money? I know this year that we definely spent under 10000, and had a competitive robot. Not saying that we wouldn't want that sort of money .

[Eric Bareiss]

Originally Posted by rforystek

Wow...I can only dream of our team being sponsored like that. The thing I've always wondered is what do you do with all that money? I know this year that we definitely spent under 10000, and had a competitive robot. Not saying that we wouldn't want that sort of money .

You can dream all you want but if you want a well funded team you're going to have to work for it. Teams like team 60 work very hard to get the money they have. They are constantly calling companies and writing letters, going to meetings and trying to come up with new ways to get sponsors.

I would highly recommend reading team 60’s marketing plan, to get an idea of what direction you need to move in and just how much work it takes to be well funded.

[michael_obrien]

our school has the "New Millenium Foundation", a non profit which alumni donate to for various school improvements, which has given us about $2,500 for the past two years. We also had a team dad donate some money, I forget how much, and his company matched him due to their policy. Also, the local ACE and Tap Plastics gave us materials discounts and such. There may have been a few more, I'd have to look at our team shirt to make sure.

Steve Wozniak lives in our town and at this year's Silicon Valley competition (he was a judge) he said that he would fund us "all the way" or something like that next year. Hopefully that turns out as well as it sounds.

[sirbleedsalot]

thank you guys for all the helpful comments that you guys have gave me and I am amazed at the speed of your repiles. As to the comment about my spelling I will not take offense to that because I know that I am a terrible speller(note my signiture), so our team will use a different meamber to try contact these companys. Also as you can see I am new here so if you could point me towards a spell checker that would be great.

[Jay H 237]

Our main sponsor donates about $10,000 to our team. They have been with us from the begining. The company I work for has given us $2500 every year. We have other conpanys and foundations that donate close to $1000 also. We send them brochures containing information about our team (and FIRST). We also mention our 501c3 status. I helped the team get money from where I work with some "inside pull". It also helps that my company builds robots and they have some interest in this program.

[sirbleedsalot]

"We also mention our 501c3 status."
what is this may I ask?

[Peter Matteson]

Sirbleeds I want to PM you some comments but the system won't let me. E-mail or pm with a way I can send you this info.

For everyone else. Remember companies want a well organized business case donating. Put together a presentation bring some video if possible and show them the what their money buys. Getting your team in the paper or on the local news only helps the cause, so it might be necessary to go do community service events where you can get your name noticed. The more ways you identify your team as a positive member of the community the easier it will be to get donations.

[c-squared_2006]

That's a good suggestion, as many of these comments are. Keep going, I need to make note of this!