I'm not on a PTO but I work for the City of Boston and run a canned food drive and fundraising campaign every year. I've found some pretty great tips/ideas on here so I just wanted to share a few of my own:
- First I've found one of the most important factors in determining whether a business will donate to you is your request letter. If you just find some generic donation request template online and fill it in with your orgs info I can tell you with certainty it will be thrown right in the trash after they get through the first couple sentences. Take the extra half hour or so and write a letter from the heart. Make it interesting, tell a story, give them facts about your cause, make the reader feel your passion and WANT to donate!! (Schools - I guarantee you have an English teacher or two who would be more than happy to help with this!) I also leave a couple "blanks" throughout the letter so I can tailor each letter for each business. The first year I sent out letters I didn't get very many responses and I think it was because I just printed out the usual generic donation letter asking for a "suitable prize for one of our raffles or auctions". Once I started personalizing each letter I started getting a lot more responses. Some examples are getting the managers name ahead of time so you can start the letter addressing them by name. Saying "Dear Sue" instead of the usual "Dear Friend" or "To Whom This May Concern" just sounds much more personal. Another thing I change with each letter is what I'm actually requesting. Most places I'll ask for gift cards, some places I'll ask for gift baskets, some I'll ask for tickets or passes. (Also, telling them it's for an auction vs. a raffle usually gets you a higher value donation) Another thing to keep in mind when writing your letters is the incentive for that particular business. For instance if you're requesting a donation from a local pizza place, you could mention that the school will start using them for every class pizza party. Or you'll write a fabulous review about their business on social media. Or you'd be happy to leave a stack of menus/coupons next to their donation at your event. Make them feel like donating to your cause will be beneficial to both of you. This absolutely will take more time than printing and mailing 200 of the same letters but if it gets you more donations then it's time well spent!!
- Another helpful tip I've found (if you have it in the budget) is to send a self addressed and stamped envelope with your request letter. The easier you make it for the company to mail you the gift card/certificate/tickets/etc. the better your chances of receiving a donation. If you're trying to save some money on postage just do this with the companies that are in your area but are too far away to drive to pick up. The majority of the larger or national companies don't even take requests via US mail anymore, but if they do they usually have it in their budget to pay for the postage/shipping.
- Now that you have your letters you need to figure out who you're going to send them to. Over the years I've come up with a list of hundreds of places. And I'm adding to that list on a daily basis! Keep donations in the back of your mind while you're out and about. Google is a HUGE help too! Google your town/cities name and donation requests, your state and donation requests, your region and donation requests, businesses that are in the area of your event or school (places that are close by are a lot more inclined to donate in hopes of gaining the people who come to the event as customers) Look on Groupon, Living Social, Amazon Local, Yipit, etc. Businesses that are advertising specials in your area are also more likely to give you a donation in hopes of gaining a few new customers.
- Finally, keep a spreadsheet going throughout this entire process. Keep track of the companies you requested donations from, their preferred method of submission (i.e online, fax, email, US mail), their contact info, whether or not they donated, and if so, what did they donate and what is the estimated value. For the companies who are local to you or who have made very generous donations, I try to make sure I send them a thank you card/letter. This year I'm planning on taking pictures of the donations at the event and trying to keep track of how much was raised for each item so I can include that in my "thank you" too.
Good luck!!
