# The Giving Room launches to turn video meetings into fundraising opportunities

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2020/05/14/the-giving-room-launches-to-turn-video-meetings-into-fundraising-opportunities/
- Published: 2020-05-14T09:38:52+01:00
- Author: Melanie May

**People holding meetings and conferences on video platforms now have the opportunity
to raise money for charities at the same time using QR codes, through new non-profit
initiative The Giving Room.**

[The Giving Room](http://www.thegivingroom.org/) has launched to provide dedicated
donation QR Codes and weblinks to charities and business video conference users 
wishing to support those charities.

It is a joint venture from contactless donation service provider [Purple Pot](https://purplepot.io/),
and [Thyngs](https://thyngs.net/), which is providing the charity donation links
and QR codes for the project, with distribution of funds to charities provided by
the [Charities Trust](https://charitiestrust.org/).

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The launch is part of an appeal to raise £200,000 over the summer for NHS charities,
people affected by Covid-19 and other charities. Those currently supported by The
Giving Room include Samaritans, Demelza, NABS and British Skin Foundation.

Users choose a charity to support and can download a cartoon virtual background 
with a QR code supporting that charity to use in their virtual meeting as their 
background. The meeting participants then see this background and can scan the QR
code with a smartphone camera to trigger a donation. Alternatively, they can copy
and paste a weblink into a chat box or invitation for their online meeting.

 

[⌊The Giving Room⌉⌊The Giving Room⌉[

 

Charities currently supported include the [UCHL appeal](https://www.uclhcharity.org.uk/)
and the National Emergencies Trust, as well as Samaritans, Mind, Shelter and St 
Elizabeth’s Hospice.

Martin Loat, Founder of Purple Pot and backer of The Giving Room, said:

> “With millions of business people now using Zoom, Teams and other online video
> platforms every day, we think we’ve found a new source of vital funding for charities.
> So we’ve made it easy for them to ask for and make small charitable donations 
> during these meetings. QR codes are so easy scan on your desktop or laptop, if
> you have a smartphone camera, and they work well as background shots on video 
> calls.
> “All we are asking is for people to give £5 or £10 to a charity they see pop up
> in a Zoom. It’s really just the price a couple of coffees or drinks that they 
> would buy if they were having a face to face meeting before lockdown happened.”

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