There are many ways to raise money for causes such as the environment, your local sports team, church, and others. Conventionally, people have turned to bake sales, lemonade stands, boutiques, and other similar outlets to raise funds. An underrated way to raise money is a shoe fundraiser. Surprisingly, a shoe drive is not a very popular fundraiser idea, even if there are many footwear enthusiasts today.
Nonetheless, it is not too late for you and your fellow advocates to start using shoes as a way to raise money. Shoes are something present in all households, and there are a lot of people passionate about them. With the power of camaraderie and technology, you can empower your cause and fundraiser!
Recruit volunteers and reach out to the local community
There are indeed some people in your local community who identify with the same advocacy as you. Reach out to friends, family, schoolmates, or co-workers who believe in your cause. Tell them about your plans for the fundraiser and sell them on the idea of a shoe drive. Talk about how it is a unique opportunity to declutter footwear outgrown by children or no longer fashionable for teens and adults.
Volunteers can help you think of how to market the campaign. Some can design posters, be ambassadors on social media, or help set up the physical booths. You can even brainstorm together and set up an online chapter so that more people can donate. The community aspect is a strong advantage, and getting more hands-on deck to help you is always welcome.
The shoe drive also presents an opportunity for people to bond and hang out together! While organizing, you can have game nights and other team-building activities to boost morale. The group of people you put together can even routinely manage other initiatives to better the community.
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Reach out to partner organizations to boost your fundraiser
You can begin your shoe drive fundraiser by reaching out to non-government organizations. By researching these groups, you may come across some specializing in getting people to donate footwear. You may contact them through emails, or you may post a call for partners on social media. This call may also raise awareness for the project and attract potential donors.
Besides organizations, you can even reach out to companies for a promotional boost. Shoe companies and footwear brands are just some of the entities you can try to contact. They may even donate a certain amount of footwear or empower the project altogether with a generous donation.
You’re saving costs and helping the environment too
Besides your advocacy, you also help other causes indirectly by organizing a shoe drive. For instance, there is a lot less money involved in organizing this campaign. There will not be any ingredients, supplies, and other new resources you need to shell out. Everything comes second hand. Plus, you minimize further costs if you secure donations from organizations and corporations.
The environment is also another entity that benefits from the shoe drive. Every year, experts trace back an obscene amount of waste to discarded shoes. Many of these go to landfills, oceans, and other places. Not only does this cause destruction of our natural resources, but they also sit in these places with nobody using them. With a shoe drive, you connect unused shoes with people who can recycle or reuse them for other purposes.
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Market your shoe drive creatively
The usual tactics for marketing will still be effective for your shoe fundraiser. Of course, you can put up posters around the community. Place them strategically in bulletin boards, trees, walls, and others. Make sure to ask permission from the local authorities to avoid getting fined! The last thing you want is an officer fining you or shutting down the fundraiser for a vandalism complaint.
Creatively design your posters. Incorporate both the shoes and the goal of your fundraiser. Talk to your volunteers and friends about the visual look and use a catchy tagline. If you’re going to post the visual aids on social media, it also helps if you develop a creative caption! That way, people will also find an incentive to comment on the post itself. Engagements are always better than simply sharing the image.
Besides a poster, you can also use the power of social media to spread the word! In a world obsessed with witty content, you or your fellow advocates can come up with a social media challenge to generate fanfare for the event. Get people to talk about their love for shoes and relate it to your championed cause. If it is for the environment, talk about how recycling shoes can help cut back on waste. If it is for sports or the church, it may help highlight the achievements and support that these institutions have given to the community.
Set a sustainable and realistic goal
As with most fundraisers, the best way to achieve your goal is to make it realistic. Although many households have excess or unused shoes, you cannot be sure that all community members will donate. Thus, it helps to keep your expectations at a reasonable amount. Start with a smaller number. Then once you have reached it, you can increase that amount to raise more funds.
This tactic limits disappointment and helps you turn in an amount of money to the beneficiaries at a faster rate! You can continue to contact them as you open another round of fundraisers or increase the goal amount. Calculate the money you raise each day, and keep track of the shoes in your inventory. It helps to have a spreadsheet of every transaction that happens for both you and your shoe drive customers.
Fundraisers are always a great way to highlight advocacy or cause. They bring out a sense of teamwork and charitability in people. A shoe drive not only makes use of items that have long been sitting idly at home but is also a new way for people to express solidarity with a cause.
