So the Mrs has me doing the Prudential RideLondon100 in July for Bliss, good for me as its another 100 miler to add to the list of sportives and money to a decent charity etc.

However, I’ve never done anything for charity before let alone done any sort of fund raising so its a bit of a moral step up for myself especially after receiving so much support from Bliss when our son was born early.

Anyway, she has an idea of getting people to either run or bike a certain distance (5k for a run or 20 miles on the bike), post a screenshot of the event in strava/runkeeper etc  to us, pop ~£10 in a justgiving account and receive a custom designed medal in the post.  Shes planning on getting 100 medals…

I like the idea but not sure how it would take and feel more like the standard bake sale, waxing of hair etc would be better.

Any opinions?

Joe

Not one single response, wow.

You want people to pay you £10 to do a Strava activity? Good luck!

Yeah, struggling to see the appeal tbh.  Why not just ask people to donate?  They usually do.

The bliss team are really good at helping you set up fundraising events etc.

But the standard shake a tin in front of family, friends and work colleagues worked for me.

Seems weird to me too – rather than ‘give me money’ it’s ‘do something AND give me money (ohh and get a pointless medal that only a kid would be excited to get)’.

Do you have to raise funds for that particular charity? If not, just say ‘I am doing a bike ride, show your support by giving something to a charity that means something to you’.

I just needed some more opinions to stop the other half wasting money on medals, she tends not to listen to me unless I have some actual backup…I had the same thought process as you guys, shake tin at people, bake cakes, ask – simple.

N.B – She’s still game for it unfortunately, even after showing her this.  Now shes trying to prove you all wrong >.<

@johndoh – Yes its for that specific charity, Bliss means a lot to us both, especially my other half.

How much are these medals going to cost you vs what minimum donation are Bliss asking for?

Seems a weird idea to me. The people who are liekly to have Strava/RunKeeper are likely to be keen runners/cyclists already. As such, they’re unlikely to want to pay a tenner to do something they were going to do anyway, and if they want a medal they’re likely to want it from a ‘proper’ event.

I’ve done two RideLondon charity rides. Each time I raise well over a grand just from firing out a sponsorship form link round work and friends. Plus, ask at work if they do ad-hoc charity grants or sponsorship matching (many places do).

Another idea is to approach work to see if they’ll let you raffle a day’s extra leave for someone. Little real cost to them, but sell tickets at a tenner a pop and the winner gets an extra day’s holiday. That can raise some real money.

It’s easy to raise money without being gimmicky. It’s also very easy to overthink it for little return.

There’s plenty of “virtual races” already, mostly for running, but probably some cycling as well. Some of them seem to be quite popular, especially if they have an interesting medal design.

You should make clear how much of the entry fee will actually go to the charity, how much will it cost for medals etc.
Could publish results, and have some sort of prizes. eg longest distance, biggest hill, best photo, best costume etc.

This sounds like The Apprentice when the Project Manager has an idea that is voted down by the team but the Project Manager goes with it anyway.  They end up getting fired every time.

@zilog6128 the medals will cost around £56 for 50.  100% of donations go straight to bliss and the cost of medals comes out of her pocket (mine in reality)

Work don’t do any matching schemes and choose very specifically from local charities who they work with for the year, generally its just one company.  This year its Macmillians cancer support.

How about get some T-shirts made up, with a pic like this from the Bliss site and a nice message like “I’m riding (running) to support families of premature babies”

Tenner a pop for the t-shirt and they have to raise their sponsorship. The fastest 50 get a thank you medal, as do the 50 highest fund raisers. Pictures posted on facebook etc in the t-shirt.

Not made it into the top 50 of either? Pic on facebook and a nice t-shirt.

not simpler just to ask people to donate.

Nowt wrong with showing some imagination. Should be commended for thinking other than the hand stretched out and ‘give me money’ approach.

Give the money youd be spending on medals and give directly to charity.

Quote – How about get some T-shirts made up, with a nice message like…..

You came early like dad did 🙂