Marcus's Fundraising Story: Corporate Sponsorship and Publicity

Marcus signed up to his school expedition to Costa Rica which will take place during the summer of 2024 and he will be supporting conservation, eco-tourism and community development projects. He planned a sports challenge and actively looked for different opportunities and jobs to reach his personal fundraising target of £4850.  What he didn’t expect was that his efforts would help him secure his fundraising goal in 3½ months.  Read on to find out how Marcus did it!

Sponsored Bike Ride

Marcus set himself the challenge of cycling the length of Costa Rica from top to bottom, 300miles, in 100 days.  To receive sponsorship for the event Marcus wrote to over 30 businesses – making sure to explain why he was fundraising and raising the awareness of the importance of the impact he will be making on expedition. Each letter was hand delivered and followed up two weeks later.

Not everyone came back with a positive response but everyone that replied and donated added another boost for morale and encouraged Marcus to keep working on contacting more businesses.

Top Tip: Marcus designed a sponsorship t-shirt. He will take the t-shirt with him to Costa Rica to promote the businesses that have helped him get there, giving those businesses more publicity.

As well as financial sponsorship, Marcus received support from the businesses he contacted in lots of other ways! He received:

• A free bike service from his local cycle centre to support him on his cycle challenge.
• A 12-month membership to the local Leisure Centre.
• Free printing for his sponsorship t-shirt.

Marcus raised a total of £2650 just from business sponsorship for his bike ride, including some grants.

Grants

Marcus also did some research and applied for multiple grants that turned out to be successful. He applied for a grant from the Rotary Club for himself and two of his friends that will be joining him on expedition.

• Howard Watson Symington Memorial Charity – £500
• Rotary Club – £150

Receiving the grant from the Rotary Club gave Marcus the opportunity to give a speech about their cause and why they applied. It also helped him with more publicity as the local radio and newspaper featured the event on their social media pages.

GoFundMe Page

Setting up a GoFundMe page was vital in helping receiving donations and publicising why Marcus was fundraising.  His mum helped set up the page on his behalf and they also added all offline donations to their GoFundMe page so everyone could see how Marcus was tracking against target.  Marcus and his Mum shared the page and added updates on all the fundraising activities.

Top Tip: The GoFundMe page was a great way for people to send donations if they didn’t have cash to hand after Marcus had completed jobs such as gardening, mowing lawns and washing cars for them.

Marcus raised over £1200 from donations from friends, family and people he didn’t know.

How did Marcus advertise his gardening and car washing services?

1. Created a leaflet and posted it to all the houses on his estate. It detailed why he was fundraising and how people could support him.
2. Advertised on his estate’s Facebook page

Additional Fundraising Activities

Marcus did a variety of other fundraising activities to help him reach his target.

• Selling and packing greeting cards.
• Leaflet drop for a local estate agent.
• Selling beaded jewellery and sweet cones. Top Tip: Buy sweets at wholesale – Marcus’s local news agent helped him purchase the sweets saving him money on bulk purchasing.
• Holding a raffle.

Top Tip:  Don’t forget to negotiate your exhibitor fee at craft fairs and events.  If the organisers know why you are fundraising, then they might just give you a discount on your stall price.

Extra Publicity

Through Marcus’s fundraising efforts he has managed to secure an article in the local newspaper and appeared on air in his first ever radio interview.

Listen to his radio debut: https://harboroughfm.co.uk/harborough-teenagers-amazing-efforts-to-fundraise-for-charity-trip/