What We Did For Fundraising

People feel uncomfortable talking about fundraising let alone doing it. Here is, hopefully, a pretty detailed rundown of exactly what we did to raise money for the appeal:

One of the first things we did was to set up a Facebook group with a number of friends who could help coordinate activities and fundraising events. The whole point is that someone with multiple sclerosis is not in the best place to go about generating £40,000 worth of income when they have a condition to deal with, fatigue, physical disability and cognitive deficits. So, therefore, friends and family are exceptionally important for helping to do the fundraising.

If you are low on friends and family, in terms of numbers, then this will undoubtedly be a greater challenge for you.

The second thing to do is to let everyone know exactly what your intentions are. I wouldn't hold back on telling people that you intend to go to Russia or wherever in order to get the best treatment for your condition. Announce things on Facebook, tell people, make sure that they know that you need to raise money in order to put yourself in the best position to halt the progression of your condition.

As soon as we knew that we were going to go to Russia, we started a GoFundMe page. I know there are alternatives sites and services to consider but we went for one of the most famous ones in the knowledge that they were given a good service. We knew there would take a cut but without their ability to do what they could do, we wouldn't have been able to raise the funds we did. In other words, the cut was worth it.

That GoFundMe page was started and then thrown around every single corner of social media that you could think of. As a blogger, I used that avenue. As an active member of Facebook, I used that avenue. Every group and page I knew on Facebook, I threw the link about. Twitter – that too.

At the same time, I realised that there would be many people who would not want to use that website due to not being Internet savvy or not wanting there to be a cut taken from their donation in any kind of way. As a result, I opened up another bank account (a joint account with my partner, just in case) so that money could be directly deposited into it from any other type of donation.

Indeed, the way that GoFundMe works is that they don't actually hold onto the money but continually "withdraw" (move) it to your dedicated bank account on a continual basis. In other words, the appeal bank account that I set up was also the repository for the GoFundMe money that was raised as it was moved across to that account on a continual automatic basis.

The rest was just good old-fashioned fundraising. 

To give you some idea of how it when it is, we raised some £14,500 on GoFundMe and some £27,000 in other ways. What this tells you is that the largest donations were outside of the GoFundMe website and came from close relatives and people who knew me well. Their generosity formed the core part of the appeal.

Here is a selection of the sorts of things, events and appeals the that we did. Remember that I was in a lucky situation... Well, having worked for three different primary schools meant that I was in a hugely privileged position in terms of fundraising:

School Fundraising:

• Sponsored run around a school (£600!)
• School discos (£250+)
• Dress up liked Mr Pearce Day (flat caps, waistcoats and big ginger sideburns) (£200+)
• Cake sales (£90+)
• Letters back to all three schools that I used to work at, and my children's school, and the school where I am presently a school governor. That's five schools who received letters about my fundraising and condition with links to the GoFundMe website.
• A massive quiz night at one of schools I used to work at. Now, this doesn't need to be school-related but we were able to use the facility for free and lots of the attendees were something to do with that school. (£300+)
• The lollipop lady at a school I used to work at (where my partner is still the business manager) organised a dinner/raffle/disco/quiz night for all the staff and family who had worked there during the 10 year period I had worked. It acted like a big school reunion, which was lovely. Has a lot of contacts. She worked tirelessly at selling raffle tickets and tickets for the night were £10 a head with at least 50 people being there. (£1000+)
• This same lady hit a whole host of local businesses and raised money from them for either rattle prizes or direct donations. She was fearless in her actions and demands and I owe her an awful lot!

So you can see that just from working at these schools, I was able to raise a good deal of money, remembering that much of this also went into the GoFundMe website appeal. If you have children at school age, then these opportunities are still available for you. But if you don't have children at school age and are not in contact with local schools in the same way, then that is certainly a missed opportunity. However, instead of schools, you have your workplaces that you either work presently or used to work at. These are massively important places for you to contact and use.

Other Fundraising:

• I approached the local newspaper to write a report about my appeal. I estimated that this raised about £1000 extra. They wrote a lovely article that also embedded a video I did for them.
• I used my blog as a way to appeal to my community of commenters who had been with me, some of them, for almost 10 years. Blogs are funny places where you get a lot of people whom you have never met but who know you very well from what you write and what you have written over 10 years. These people come to know and appreciate you and they were exceptionally kind in their generosity towards my appeal.
  
• I sent an email to an old school friend who I knew was in contact with the full range of people who I used to go to school with all those years ago. He kindly sent an email around to every single contact he had concerning my predicament and kindly asked for donations. This made a huge impact. As a result, I received a large number of very generous donations.
• Even though I have nothing to do with the Freemasons, two different Mason "chapters" or whatever you call them donated kindly to the cause.

• A local comedian (whose son went to one of the schools are you will use to work at) had buckets at one of his gigs at half time and raised over £170.
• The son of a teacher I used to work with is presently learning to swim and managed to do 24 length is at a sponsored swim. I believe that his fundraising is still going! It is reached over £300 now.
• My own children decided to do a little cake sale at school. I keep this separate from the school fundraising because they are my own children…
• The aunt of my cousin's newlywed wife (just show you the strangled paths these things sometimes take) heard about my predicament and decided to paint an absolutely beautiful painting. This was auctioned off (my parents bought it for £500).
  
• The football team that I used to manage is part of a larger club. The Crofton Saints. They very kindly donated £500 and waved the plater subs for my boys during this time.
• I applied to a charity in the local area called "Football For Cancer" and they exceptionally generously donated £750 towards my appeal.
• My last public speech (on the lovely topic of psychology and morality) went down a treat and the organisers very kindly donated all of their proceedings to my treatment. That was supreme generosity.
• And, of course, I can't forget the countless, countless individual donations from people both on the GoFundMe website and more personally who donated with such generosity and consistency.

Had I not already reached my target, I would have also approached the local TV news stations for coverage in the same way that I did for the local newspaper. I know this would have been the ideal sort of news report that they would have loved to have covered. However, I didn't need to do this in the end.

As mentioned earlier, however, I did also rely on some very sizeable donations from close relatives. Without these donations, fundraising would have taken longer and been somewhat more challenging. I even had a very generous benefactor in America (partly through my blogging) who helped a great deal.

I have not given an exhaustive list or appraisal of the fundraising that we did for fear that this blog entry would go on too long. However, you can get the idea that there are so many options available for fundraising. You need to think creatively, both big and small, and think of every single avenue that you can "exploit"

Some people to really big one-off nights – black-tie events with huge raffles and whatnot. Other people do series of smaller events. It's about getting help, mainly, and doing your very best to think outside the box.