Fundraising: "Donate to Your Number" Fundraiser

Dick Moss, Editor, Physical Education Update.com

Here's a fundraiser that's effective for team sports. It taps into your former athletes by establishing a personal interest in their current counterpart on the team.

How it Works
Send a solicitation letter to your alumni asking for support for the player currently wearing their old uniform number. For example:

"We're asking you to support the player wearing your old number - Number 80. His name is Josh Hubbard, and like you, he is a wide receiver."

In return for this financial support, the donor will receive a personal letter from the athlete, thanking the donor for the contribution.

You'll have to decide what amount to ask for. For example, the Queen's University football team asks for $250. For a high school team, you might find a different number (i.e. $50, $100) more appropriate.

Printing the Letters
Most word processing programs, such as Microsoft Word, provide a mail-merge program that makes it easy to personalize such letters. By adding personal data, such as names and numbers into a database, you can print these letters and envelopes en masse.

One of the keys to such direct-mail campaigns is that the easier it is to respond to your request, the greater your response will be. So, you can optimize your campaign by including a pre-printed return envelope with every request letter. These envelopes can also be printed using a simple word-processing program.

What If You Don't Know Past Numbers?
This fundraiser works particularly well if you've kept the records of your past rosters and numbers.

However, if you don't know your alumni's numbers, send a generic letter that requests support for the athlete currently wearing their old number and asks what that number was (most will remember). You can make the number-match after you receive the donation.

Dick Moss, PE Update.com, June 2019.

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