At our last fundraising team meeting we discussed several possibilities of what the planned auction event will entail. By the end of the meeting we had agreed to begin work on planning a traditional sort of auction (held away from the school with food and drinks, adult only, etc.) However, there was some trepidation about the level of effort this type of event would require, so we agreed to assess the planning and recruiting effort after a month and determine whether to scale back our ambitions.
Since last Monday's meeting, I've spoken to a couple of people who have reiterated the argument that the monetary (and community) return from an auction may not match the effort expended. Both Scott Ringgold and Cambria Cox have independently presented similar ideas to me for smaller-scale events.
Scott has suggested approaching the Columbia City Cinema about showing a family-friendly matinee with a portion of the proceeds to GH. He also suggested that a benefit concert (a la the Pearl Django show of a few years ago) would be a good event.
Cambria has an idea to do a holiday shopping benefit with some of the stores and restaurants in Columbia City (Retroactive Kids, La Medusa, the Cinema, etc.) in addition to a child artwork focused auction (perhaps held at the C-City Gallery?). These might be two distinct events with the auction held in the spring. The holiday benefit could also involve a matinee at the Cinema as well as gift-wrapping service. Cambria expressed that she would be willing to take the lead on planning events of this type.
I hate to keep circling back around with this because I feel there is an urgency to start work on whatever event we will hold, but (with a couple of exceptions) I have not sensed much enthusiasm for a full-blown auction. It will take determined leadership to pull off this type of event and we don't have that at this point.
We currently have a fundraising gap of $18,000 in the 2008-09 PTA budget. This gap is the impetus behind the auction. In analyzing how other schools in the city are raising money, it seems that those schools which are raising more than GH all rely heavily on an auction. It seems as though an auction is the most likely way to raise this sort of figure in a single event. However, maybe it makes sense for us to chip away at this goal with two or three smaller-scale events. Maybe one of these smaller events could mature into something that would generate more funding in the years ahead.
Another prong in our strategy could be to devote more resources to the Annual Fund drive and grantwriting efforts. A suggestion has been made to produce more polished Annual Fund literature in a push to broaden the audience that might reach. I feel that the expense that we would incur for printing could be easily offset by the gains in giving.
What are your thoughts on what the mix of fundraising efforts should be?
