A Christmas selection of fundraising novelties
Howard Lake | 18 December 2011 | Blogs
The approach to Christmas this year has already yielded a wide range of online and offline fundraising activities, so I thought I’d share some with you here, and invite you to suggest your own.
In case you missed them
We have of course featured several Christmas fundraising stories recently including:
• 22 December sees peak of online donations via JustGiving
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• Localgiving.com Christmas campaign offers £125,000 in matched funding
• Twitter charity song an instant hit
You can find these and many more fundraising stories from Christmas past at
www.fundraising.co.uk/news/christmas
But there are so many Christmas fundraising stories that we have decided to pull together a selection for you.
Twitter Advent Calendar
A Twitter Advent Calendar is raising funds for Marie Curie Cancer Care. Its creator Stuart Witts (@stuartwitts) describes it as “a social advent calendar populated by tweeters”. Any Twitter user can take part and contribute a Christmas-related picture. They just have to tweet them with the hashtag #Twadvent to take part. Kodak is offering a digital photo frame as a prize for the best picture.
Participants are invited to make a donation to Marie Curie Cancer Care via JustGiving in return for the pleasure of opening the digital doors on the calendar.
This is the second year that Witts, who describes himself as a “Social Media Conversationeer at a national charity” has run #Twadvent. Both times he has used curation tool Storify.com.
Kids Company wish list at John Lewis
Kids Company hasn’t set up an online shop this Christmas and is instead using the John Lewis Gift List facility. To order you just search for the gift list via its number 484121. At the top of the list is the option to donate a minimum of £10 to Kids Company’s CAF Charity Account.
Items to buy include t-shirts, a football, a table football game, woolly hats, toys and much more.
Dogs Trust’s Ho, No, No campaign
Dogs Trust is running a campaign to urge Harrods and other pet shops across the UK to help prevent pet sales that are regretted once the festive season is over.
It has partnered with CharityGreetings in its Ho, No, No campaign to enable supporters to send a free Christmas Card to Harrods or an outlet of their choice to ask them to stop selling puppies at Christmas.
Dogs Trust is funding the free cards but they say that “if you want to help our message go even further and help dogs at the same time, you can opt to pay for a card yourself.
Flashmob choir
On 1 December Crystal Chords descended as a flashmob choir on a Tesco Superstore in Cheetham Hill, Manchester, to surprise shoppers with a Christmas carol. The singers were collecting for Alzheimer’s Society and Alzheimer Scotland and to raise awareness of dementia during the festive season.
The 30-strong ladies barbershop chorus stunned Tesco customers when they broke into a capella harmony singing ‘Jingle Bells’ in the middle of the busy supermarket.
Andrew Brown, Tesco store manager said: “The flashmob took both our staff and customers by complete surprise, creating a wonderfully Christmassy atmosphere to kick-start the festive season. Alzheimer’s Society and Alzheimer Scotland are our charity of the year and as a store we’ve been doing lots to fund raise for them this year, so we’re delighted to be hosting this fantastic event for such a worthwhile cause.”
Gift cards from Fairsharemusic.com
Fairshare Music, who donate 50% of their profits to charities, have launched download gift cards just in time for Christmas. “With over 16 million tracks to choose from and albums costing just £5, the giftcards are perfect stocking fillers”. The gift cards are available in £5, £15 and £25 versions.
Profits from each track are donated to charities including Amnesty International, War Child, Centrepoint, Friends of the Earth and Great Ormond Street Hospital.
Santas ln the Run
Foresters UK, part of the international financial services organisation has sponsored the annual Santa Run in Oxford in aid of Helen & Douglas House Hospice. The event took place on Sunday 11 December and 1,200 supporters all dressed up as Santa went on a sponsored run through the streets of Oxford. Santas on the Run is a series of fun runs which sees national charity Children’s Hospices UK and children’s hospices throughout the country working together to raise awareness and vital funds. This is the fifth year that the event has taken place.
v’s 12 days of Christmas
Volunteering charity v says that “Time is the most valuable gift you can give this Christmas” so asks “How many of the 12 Christmas actions can you do?” Their 12 Days of Christmas campaign suggests 12 different activities for people to do, including fundraising while you shop, plant next year’s Christmas tree, fill a shoebox for Christmas, and check-in for charity.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.