Overview
A great way to support local charities is to allow your customers to become involved in the process. Ask them what charities they support, and make a day (or night) of fundraising for that charity. It can be as easy as donating a portion of that day’s sales to the charity or school.
See the Charity & Community Give-Back Guide for the comprehensive approach to this topic.
Details
If you run a pizza place, consider donating $4 for every large pizza ordered, $2 for every salad ordered and $1 each for sides and desserts ordered to the selected charity. The charity can spread the news to their friends and family to visit the location closest to the charity or school on a certain day, and your business will likely see new and existing customers come in!
To encourage even better turnout, offer to help the charity by creating custom flyers featuring your business information, the details of the fundraising efforts, and the charity’s purpose.
Advertise your ability to help your customers fundraise by creating a “Fundraise With Us!” section on your website and sending a letter or flyer to local schools letting them know about your program. Don’t forget to talk to in-store customers about your new fundraising abilities!
Most importantly, remember to follow your company’s guidelines for making charitable donations for this and any other event in which you are donating money, services, goods or time to a charity.
Here’s an example from Chipotle.
Chipotle worked with a local school to “make dinner a selfless act.” They held a fundraiser to support a local middle school. People could go into the Chipotle on the Tuesday evening, show the flyer with their purchase and the school will get 50% of the proceeds from the purchases.
The school promoted it in their daily update email to parents in the week leading up to it.
Chipotle was driving sales, on what is probably a slower night, and partnering with the community to give back. While they are a national chain, they were making their location locally relevant to their community.
See more ideas like this one in see Charity Events.
