Get your spirits up because it’s that time of year! With the fall and Homecoming season in play, it’s the perfect time to brainstorm some ideas for cheerleading fundraisers. Here are five different ways to approach cheer fundraisers, with some ideas to hit the ground running and achieve all of your cheerleading fundraising goals.
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5 Great Cheerleading Fundraising Ideas
1. Peer-to-Peer Crowdfunding
Peer-to-peer fundraising events (P2P) that work great for cheer and dance groups include: Fun Run and Walk-a-thon fundraisers, Community Service projects, and Spin-a-thons. We’ve seen the power of peer-to-peer fundraising and how effective fundraising can be when leveraging personal relationships for cheerleading fundraisers. It begins with finding a particular goal or mission to revolve the campaign around, such as new uniforms or an annual trip. Assign each cheerleader a goal of a certain amount to fundraise. Then the cheerleading team contacts their friends, families and community to help support their cause and help them reach their goals. It is also essential to work with the cheerleaders to show them how to communicate the goal and the importance of support from their friends, family and community. See more on encouraging your peer-to-peer participants to fundraise.
DoJiggy’s Crowdfunding Software makes running P2P events easy and effective.
2. Sweets, Treats and Goods Cheer Fundraisers
Cheerleaders are outgoing and connected members of the school and community. For that reason, product sales are always a good idea for cheer fundraising.
- Sell School Paraphernalia: Get the crowd ready to shout and cheer with all of the right school paraphernalia. These can include mascot stuffed animals, temporary tattoos, foam hands, pom-poms, jerseys, shirts, caps and more, which are great sources of funds towards the cheerleading fundraisers.
- Sweets: Shop around for the highest profits for selling such sweets and goodies like flavored popcorn, cookies, candy, pretzels and snacks.
- Seasonal Catalog Goods: The holidays always find people looking for unique gift ideas, ready to spend a little more than usual. Another great option is a catalog with seasonal or holiday goods, which often include treats, gift wrap and home goods.
- Natural Specialty Goods: For more healthy goods, consider looking at catalogs that offer specialty items, such as coffee, flower bulbs, candles, and natural soap fundraisers.
- Sell Gift Certificates: Work with local business to sell gift certificates that can give a certain percentage of the certificates sold towards the cause.
3. Raffle Fundraising Ideas
Raffle ticket sales are another great fundraising idea for cheerleading groups. Try these ideas:
- 50/50: An appealing way to raise funds is with a 50/50 fundraiser. The concept of a 50/50 is that people buy tickets for a chance to win 50% of the funds raised. Be sure to take the extra step to research local laws and statutes to confirm that a 50/50 fundraiser is allowed and is not considered gambling – before you start.
- Fundraising Raffles: With strong sponsors on board to donate in-kind services and goods as prizes, sell raffle tickets at a sports or school event for a chance for ticket-holders to win great prizes. The prize can also be as simple as reserving the best seat in the house at the school games.
4. Event-Based Cheer Fundraisers
Get the school and the community excited with these event fundraising ideas. Utilize event management software to make it easy to register participants and sponsors for your cheerleading event fundraisers. Give your donors an easy website to make donations with a secure payment processor.
Local businesses love participating with school events because it provides the benefit of building their brand and reputation within the community. Oftentimes, their employees and their families are students or alumni of the local school, so it is only natural to extend their support. Here are some great ways that benefit both local businesses and help with cheerleading fundraisers:
- Pep Rally Pie Time: Take advantage of the high spirits of the pep rally and host a “We’re Going to Cream the Other Team” theme, which can involve cream pie-related games. One game can be a pie-eating contest where contestants pay to play. Another game option involves attendees dropping money into a bucket or pitcher in front of the teachers, coaches, principals and other school staff they want to see pied in the face.
- Special Night Out: Host a Spirit Night with a local business, in that a percentage of the profits from patronizing on a certain date goes towards the cheerleading fundraisers. These events work well at local diners, pizza joints and any popular family restaurants near the school. Cheerleaders should help staff the event and sell raffle tickets during the evening.
5. Selling Your Own Services & Stuff
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Sometimes the best kind of fundraisers are the ones that come from the team’s own hard work.
- Car Washes: Great for the summertime, host a car wash that involves the cheerleading team, sports team, coaches and more to chip-in on the cleaning efforts. Utilize a place that has a lot of space for cars to circulate and hookups to hoses, such as the school parking lot on a free weekend. Include box lunches and cold drinks to earn more.
- Holiday Gift Wrapping: Tis’ the season for gift giving once the days get chilly, and it’s the perfect time for a gift wrapping fundraiser. Inquire with the local mall, stores, church or other businesses if they can host a space for the gift wrapping fundraiser for a given weekend. A great holiday fundraising idea!
- Bake Sale/Food Sale: For a classic cheer fundraiser, have the team get busy in the kitchen and prepare some brownies, cookies and cakes to sell at school or sporting events. Be sure to include gluten-free and low sugar options, so everyone can participate. For a twist on the bake sale, there can also be a food sale, such as a gourmet pancake or waffle breakfast on a Saturday or Sunday morning at school.
- Garage Sale: Got plenty of junk in the closet that you’re looking to get rid of? Why not put it towards a good use and host a community garage sale? Utilize the gym or lunchroom as a place to display all the goods for sale.
Tips for Successful Cheerleading Fundraisers
Plan the Goals for the Year: Start off the year with a clear fundraising goal. How many funds are needed to successfully reach your goal? From there, decide how many cheer fundraisers and events are needed to achieve your goal, with enough room in between each event to gather all of the resources to execute the event.
Gather All the Man Power to Succeed: Not only do the cheerleaders participate, but get the parents, coaches and community involved. Parents and coaches may have established relationships with businesses within the community, which are essential in gaining sponsorship support for in-kind and monetary donations.
Have All the Right Tools: Many of the ideas above require a lot of organization in both assigning the volunteers for each event and accurately accounting of the funds raised. Make sure to have good fundraising software that can ease your planning and cheerleading fundraising efforts. Another benefit of having good fundraising software is to assure that your cheerleading fundraising goals stay on track as you progress through the school year, especially for peer-to-peer cheerleading fundraising campaigns.
Evaluate the Event’s Success: Event evaluation and recap is an important part of the process of planning fundraising events. Your team needs to learn what worked well and what can be done better the next time around. Be sure to get together and discuss the event within a week, when everyone’s memories are fresh.
Thank the Supporters, Sponsors and Team: Also important after a successful cheerleading fundraiser, always remember to thank the supporters, sponsors and team for their efforts towards achieving the cheerleading fundraising goal. Communication is the key to receiving continuous support and donor loyalty. Keeping your supporters in the loop on how you’ve progressed is vital to maintaining their support to future events and causes. Go team!
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