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Fundraisers: Are They Doing The Job?
I recently read an article about fundraising and what they actually raise for fire departments and it really makes you wonder: are we getting our money's worth?
Getting together for a fundraiser is certainly a great way to gauge public support, but let's face it; a pancake breakfast won't buy a thermal imaging camera. If you look at prices, cameras can cost $10,000. If you charge five bucks a meal, that's 2000 meals! Most likely, it will take a couple of years or more than one fundraiser a year just to get a camera.
Sure; you're putting your face in front of the public, but it's a lot of work to come up short on your much needed purchases.
So, my question is still: what do you expect from your fundraisers?
I'll be right over there.
TCSS.
Art
Getting together for a fundraiser is certainly a great way to gauge public support, but let's face it; a pancake breakfast won't buy a thermal imaging camera. If you look at prices, cameras can cost $10,000. If you charge five bucks a meal, that's 2000 meals! Most likely, it will take a couple of years or more than one fundraiser a year just to get a camera.
Sure; you're putting your face in front of the public, but it's a lot of work to come up short on your much needed purchases.
So, my question is still: what do you expect from your fundraisers?
I'll be right over there.
TCSS.
Art
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by T.J. on
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we do a lot of them and we probably make around $15,000 a year by doing them, thats 2 public dances with a live band, 2 car washes, and all the raffles we do. So I say yes there worth it aslong as you do something that the public likes and will spend money on:)
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Permalink Reply by Ray Edwards on
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We do a golf tournament each April.We raise a few thousand for a little work. Not bad.The golf brings alot of people together.
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Permalink Reply by Tiger Schmittendorf on
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I'll weigh in on this Art -
As the fire department struggles to be everything it once was to the community (including the social epicenter), individual firefighters struggle to be everything they once were to the fire department. [That's from my Pyramid Scheme blog]
Therefore, we have to look at the cost-efficiency of everything we do, including and especially fundraisers. Look at the dollars generated - per manhour required to plan, prepare for and execute your fundraiser. If that figure doesn't exceed the nationally recognized value of a volunteer hour ($17 and change), chances are your fundraiser is not cost effective to run.
First we have to ask ourselves: "What's wrong with this picture?"
When was the last time the police department ran a carnival to put another patrolman on the street? Has your highway department ever held a bake sale to buy a new plow?
I don't think so. Then why is it that the only town department that has the ability to save lives and tax dollars, is also the only town department that provides its labor for FREE and is also the only town department that has to hold fundraisers to underwrite the cost of operations that the citizens (reads: customer) should be paying for?
The answer is: We've allowed ourselves to be the "poop boys" of the community service industry for so long that we feel guilty if we can't raise enough money or have to cut back on services. It's almost like we suffer from some twisted form of battered-spouse syndrome.
That being said, I've determined that the survival and success of the volunteer fire service relies on our ability to create more opportunities for more people to volunteer less time.
Did your firefighters sign up to be fundraisers? No. They signed up to be firefighters.
Therefore, the solution is to figure out a way to financially afford to let them be just firefighters (as in: get your municipality to pony up what they should have been paying all along) -OR- embrace the FireCorps concept and recruit people just to do fundraising and all the other stuff your firefighters didn't sign up for.
Too often, we're our own worst enemy because our love for the community is deeper than our pocketbooks. That's not a bad thing. What is a bad thing is that we've done a terrible job of helping the paying customers to realize that this situation isn't healthy for them or us.
Simply put, we need to work smarter - not harder. There is a better way. The answers are right in front of us. It just takes some imagination and a lot of hard work. That's a step you can never skip.
The caveat to this discussion is that we also need to quantify the social value of a particular fundraising effort or event - not just the financial value. The bottom line is that the event needs to provide the fire department with a tangible return on investment in order to be truly successful.
Sorry for the rant, but you started it. Great to hear from you, brother.
Stay safe. Train often.
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Sorry Bob -
My mistake. Say hi to Tommy Howe for me.
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Permalink Reply by anne potter on
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are you kidding if it was not for the fundraising for our dept we would not be able to have anything.. We live off $16,000 thats it for contract money.. We got our thermal camara from a member item from our congress man.. $200 pays the nimo for the month.. so alot of work from all continues to allow the truck out the front door when the siren goes off.....
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Permalink Reply by Barry Homyack on
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In our town, we have 5 Vol. firehouses. Each fire house does its own thing. But the fundraisers that we do is not to buy equipment, it is for what we need in our firehouses, or go on a fishing trip, or going on a week long trip to Las Vegas, or to Mexico, etc. The equipment we purchase is all paid for by the city of Garfield,NJ, out of the fire budget for the year. We have a pancake breakfast, we send fund raising letters out to everyone in town,etc. But thay money dont go to buy equip. My company Vol Truck company makes a lot of money each year on the different fund raaising that we do. I cannot tell you anything about we make, cause thats a secret. Anyone talking about that in town will get a person thrown out of there fire house.
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Permalink Reply by Damon Dyer on
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I understand that is the same amount we try to run on and that is a good year .
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I appreciate your situation Anne but it's unfortunate that your town does not properly fund your fire department for the services it's receiving.
My point was that we need to get better at educating our politicians and taxpayers about our value and valued services.
We have documented studies that indicate our small fire department saves our taxpayers more than $1 million dollars a year. The 94 volunteer fire departments in our county save taxpayers more than $203 million a year.
Too many municipalities have adopted the theory of "Why buy the cow if you can get the milk for free?" for too long.
They need a wake up call and we need to be the ones to deliver it. No one is going to help us if we don't help ourselves first.
Food for thought.
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Those are all appropriate incentives and it's good that you take that approach.
I'm a firm believer that while people pay taxes for fire protection, if they donate a dollar more, it's because they value the services of the volunteers who protect their communities.
Therefore, we're stupid if we don't reinvest that money in our most valuable assets - our people. Without them, no apparatus moves and no lives get saved.
As long as we're honest with our financial supporters as to where the money is being spent, I don't see a problem with it.
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Permalink Reply by Joe Stoltz on
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I have to agree 100% with Tiger’s analysis of the situation.
In the 1970s, our department made $3 in fund raising activities for every dollar received from the town contract. Today, we find that this has turned around, and in fact our total fundraising profits are only about 10 per cent of the total budget. The town contracts supply the bulk of our funding. One way of measuring the cost of fire protection is in terms of dollars per thousand dollars of assessed property value. Ours is about $1.00 per thousand.
We used to make better than $1,000 on a chicken BBQ but we rarely make that much any more. Our clam bake’s profits have eroded because of rising food costs. Last year we discontinued our turkey raffle because of its poor return on investment.
We have been toying with the idea of abolishing the fund raising part and having our contracts cover the remaining 10% - getting us totally out of the fund raising business – but we haven’t done so yet. Some of the members feel that the social aspect of working the barbecues and clam bakes is worth the tremendous effort required to plan and execute these events. Others are just too burned out to give any extra time outside of the regular training and meeting requirements expected of all members. Oh yes, and we have to answer the fire and ambulance calls, too.
For those departments that feel they need to do fundraisers to stay in business, it is time for your communities to be educated as to what service you provide for free, and how much it costs to provide this service. If you negotiate annual contract amounts with the town(s) you cover, you need to look ahead and work toward having the town/village take over these costs. Meet with the town board or governing authority to discuss the reality of the situation: membership is declining, and it is not going to get any better if you have to continue to be self-supporting through fundraising activities. Eventually the organization is going to collapse and the town residents will suffer.
It should do one of two things: either motivate scores of people to come forward and volunteer, or crack open their checkbooks and give their added financial support. I expect that the latter would happen.
As far as the social aspect of fundraising is concerned – the “camaraderie” and team-building aspects, mainly – wouldn’t it be better to foster these qualities through hands-on training drills? Getting to know someone while flipping chicken does not guarantee that you will work well with the same person at 3 AM with fire showing.
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Nicely done Joe -
I was going to mention several of those same points but ran out of breath.
Here's an article I pulled out of my archives titled "Checkbook Volunteerism" that you might find interesting.
For more articles like this, check out or subscribe to: www.charitychannel.com. - Attachments:
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CheckbookVolunteerism.pdf, 16 KB
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