A Word from a Dedicated Fundraising Coach

GUEST POST FROM LONG-TIME FUNDRAISING COACH, STACEY WARD-STONE

My name is Stacey Ward-Stone and I have worked with the FundScrip team since February 2006. In these four years, I have met some great people, all very passionate and dedicated to achieving their fundraising goals. I feel fortunate to have introduced them to our unique program and its great benefits, while continuing with them on their fundraising journey.

FundScrip has been able to help so many different kinds of groups. For many of my participating competitive / school teams for example, these people all simply shopped for groceries, gas, clothing, and entertainment as per usual; however, their big payoff was being able to subsidize, or in some cases completely pay for their travel to Hawaii, Florida, Spain, Barbados, Australia, Scotland, etc.

Some of my other groups have used the funds to assist with building schools in Haiti, assisting health initiatives in India, funding their particular foundations, helping their child succeed through sport, dance, travel groups, youth groups, etc.

One piece of wisdom I have gathered over the years of working with my groups is to set goals, and make them attainable. Often this requires breaking down the effort to a concrete, tangible level. For example, one of my schools in Ontario offered a Scientist in the Schools program. The program cost the school approximately $7.50 per student.  At a Meet the Teacher barbeque this past September, 2009, the school council pre-purchased a bunch of gift cards, for sale at this school function. People came with their cheque books to the school, because they were ready to support the school through their everyday shopping. As this wise admin handed the supporters their gift cards, she told each person that purchased $200 worth of grocery cards (a $6.00 rebate) that they had basically paid for one student to be able to attend the Scientist in the School program … and they weren’t out one penny! They would be spending this money on groceries regardless! This indeed broke the fundraising effort down to a very tangible level, one easily understood and appreciated by the school supporters :)

In short, this is a great program and an amazing opportunity for people to receive rebates back, for shopping for those items they will be purchasing anyway. FundScrip, with its program, coaching, and its many on line and off line support materials, is helping to raise some serious funds for groups all across Ontario. And … I am very proud to be a part of that!

Stacey Ward-Stone / Fundraising Coach

* Stacey is an independant consultant who has been recruiting, training and coaching FundScrip groups since February 2006. She can be reached at stacey at fundscrip dot com.