My trouble with fund raising.

[BaldwinNYRookie]

I don't know about you... but fund raising to go to Atlanta has been extremely difficult for me. Today I walked around in the pouring rain for two hours with two other team members... and please understand, when I say pouring, I mean pouring! You'd have trouble finding weather like this in the Bible, okay. TWO HOURS almost, trying to get buisnesses to buy ad space in the team journal that is going to be printed... and we got nothing, not a dime. The $313 that each team member must have in by tomorrow to reserve a ticket to Atlanta is not easy to get. The three of us we have made $47... So my question is, how do you raise the dough for your team? And does anyone else have this kind of problem or is it just me?

[Katie Reynolds]

Chase,

I moved this thread to the fundraising forum. Check out some of the threads - there are some great ideas here!

Personally, no matter what you choose to do to raise money you need to start early and do it often! Sometimes, you'll have no problem getting $1,000 while other times it will be hard to get $5!

Good luck.

[Rick TYler]

Originally Posted by BaldwinNYRookie

I don't know about you... but fund raising to go to Atlanta has been extremely difficult for me. Today I walked around in the pouring rain for two hours with two other team members... and please understand, when I say pouring, I mean pouring! You'd have trouble finding weather like this in the Bible, okay. TWO HOURS almost, trying to get buisnesses to buy ad space in the team journal that is going to be printed... and we got nothing, not a dime. The $313 that each team member must have in by tomorrow to reserve a ticket to Atlanta is not easy to get. The three of us we have made $47... So my question is, how do you raise the dough for your team? And does anyone else have this kind of problem or is it just me?

I thought about sending this in a private message, but I decided it might have general interest. After an 8-year career with Andersen Consulting as a programmer, project leader, and technical guru without portfolio, I switched to sales for a little while and then to technical marketing. I've made my share of cold sales calls.

I am not suggesting that you did anything wrong at all. You might even have been using better strategy than this. Think of this as an open letter to any high school student who wants to call on businesses. I'm also making this up as I go along here, so feel free to chime in with advice, admonitions, suggestions, and other bits of accumulated wisdom. The hivemind knows more than any one of us.

First, look neat and tidy. Wear the closest thing you have to the clothes your parents wear. Khaki Dockers instead of jeans, shirts with buttons instead of your 9-Inch Nails t-shirt, and, for the girls, something that covers your midriff. Pretend you are going on a job interview at an accounting firm. I wouldn't bother with sports coats, suits or ties. We know you're high school students, not new MBAs. Comb your hair. Make sure there's no food on your shirt. Leather shoes would be better than sneakers. Most small business owners are older and more conservative than you are. Play their game.

Second, act professional. Make eye contact and introduce yourself with confidence as you shake hands. If you haven't ever learned how to shake hands, ask an adult. There is a simple, straight-forward handshake that business people and most adults learn that you can learn in about 30 seconds. Be firm, but not crushing, shake the other person's hand up and down once or twice, then let go. Make sure your hands are clean. Few things are worse than a limp-fish handshake from someone who spent the morning squishing slugs with their fingers. I've taught 6-year-olds how to shake hands properly, it's not hard.

Third, speak confidently. No mumbling. Prepare a 10-second speech and practice it until you can say it in your sleep. My son did this raising money for his Boy Scout high adventure trips and earned about double what most other Scouts did. A sample speech for my son would be something like:

"Hi, my name is John Tyler and I'm a sophomore at Eastlake High School. May I speak to the owner or manager, please?"

When you get to the boss, he would say, "Hi, my name is John Tyler and I'm a sophomore at Eastlake High School. I'm a member of the robotics engineering program at Eastlake, and we have the opportunity to go to the national robotics team championships in Atlanta. To make this trip we are selling ads in our team program, and are asking local businesses to support us. Would you like a $250 full page ad, or the half-page ad for $150?"

This is called an "assumptive close." The business person will most likely be amused and impressed that you took such a hard-sell approach, and will think you are cute and aggressive. With any luck, you will remind them of what they were like when they were young. Remember that their business became successful because THEY looked someone in the eye and asked them to spend money on THEIR product or service. I guarantee that hardly any of them will get mad or throw you out. If they do, hey, there's another business right next door.

You will get MUCH farther with a direct, firm business approach than if you sort of shuffle in and approach them with a, "Hi, we're raising money for our club. You wanna buy an ad or something?"

Johns secret speech for raising money for Boy Scouts was even simpler, "Hi, my name is John and I am a Boy Scout here in Sammamish. We are raising money for a canoe trip in Minnesota by aerating lawns using that machine over there (points to machine). May I aerate your lawn for you?" Only one other Scout raised as much as John, and he memorized his speech, too.

Let us know how you approached businesses and maybe we can help you improve your approach. Good selling!

[BaldwinNYRookie]

Thanks for the advice, I tried to look and sound as professional as possible but it isn't easy when you practically have to swim from one place of buisiness to an other. I'm still soaked as I type this. And... wait a minute... yep! Now it stops raining! Just an hour later! Anyway I'll try to remeber some of your tips next time I go out. Thank you very much.

[KathieK]

Networking. It's a huge thing. If you can expand your team to include more adult mentors, they in turn can reach out to more companies. Many companies still make matching donations. Adults know other adults who own businesses. It can spread from there.

You might want to meet year-round and focus on fundraising in the off-season. We do car washes in the summer months and other fundraisers when other school clubs and teams are not fundraising. Contact your local civic groups, elementary school PTOs and Cub scout/boy scout/browine/girl scout troops to schedule demonstrations of the robots for the early fall months (they are booking these NOW). We usually ask for donations for our demonstrations.

As for immediate fundraising that's harder. Is anyone on your team considering pursuing a career in fire science? See if your local firefighters can help you out by doing a "fill the boot" campaign one evening or Saturday. Get the word out into the community via an article in the Newspaper or on TV. Contact your Chamber of Commerce. Don't forget your local cable channel -we're always amazed at how many people watch that. Stand in front of the local grocery store, with a robot that is MOVING. A robot standing still doesn't look like anything to anyone outside of FIRST. Remember, most people think of R2D2 when they think "robot". Look in the paper to see what is happening in town this weekend. Contact the organizers, explain your situation, and see if you can piggyback onto their event.

[FusionDude364]

This may be a little late for your team to do at all, well it is. But for next year this is something you could do. On Team Fusion we have an annual Golf Tournament that is our major fundraiser for the year. This year alone we raised $31,000 from it alone. We have some very generous corporate sponsors and I would like to thank them, but we have to raise most of our own money in order to go to our regional then nationals. I am thankful that we have those opportunities. We have won the entrepreneurship award before because of our fundraising. If you visit our website and go to the downloads section, we have a packet available to download on how to run a successful golf tournament, and we hand out cds with the information on them at nationals. Here is a link to the download page. Download the "how to run a successful...", and sponsorship forms and packets. An example of how this works is tee sign sales. For a business to get a tee sign, they must donate $100 dollars. The tee sign only costs about $10 max to make. If you only sell 18 tee signs, one for each hole, you already make $1620. Banners are the same way. Then, each year save the banners. If a company or whomever wants to sponsor again, you already have the banner or tee sign, so the sponsorship is pure profit. Next example is mulligan sales. If you have a standard 4 person team on each of the 18 holes, that is 72 golfers. We also put every single sponsor from tee signs and banner sales on the back of our shirts for the year. Then mulligans are $5 a pieces, maximum of 2 mulligans. Most will buy 2. That is 72 golfers times $10 for 2 mulligans, so $720 just in the time they register and buy mulligans. I know this is too late for your team this year, but this is something you may want to think about in the future.