How to Have a Successful Fun Run for Charity
A Fun Run is when you set up a day where people get together and run/walk for charity. You get money for charity by asking different businesses to sponsor different groups of people as a team. Usually they pledge to give a certain amount of money per lab or mile finished by the team.
How to Set Up the Event
1.You will initially want to talk to a school or some other organization that has a track and ask them if they will let you use the track. Often if you mention that it is for charity, they will be willing to let you use it for free or a discounted price. If you are planning on having the event during cold months you will definitely want to see if you can get access to an indoor track. Your attendance will be higher if people know they aren’t going to freeze.
2.Once you have set up a time, how long you want it to be (most Fun Runs I have experienced have run/waling time for two hours, 20 minutes explaining rules and how you will keep track of their laps, and then 30 minutes at the end announcing and giving out prizes) and place for your fun run, you will want to start getting the word out to get teams to sign up for the run. One way to get people interested in signing up is to offer incentives, like coupons to stores and prizes to the three teams that raise the most money or run the longest distance. Once again if you talk to different businesses many will be glad to give you coupons, and prizes to give out especially if you let them know that there companies name will be on your fliers. Some good places to contact are high school National Honor Societies and if you have a college or junior college nearby contact them and find out if they have any service organizations. These organizations are always looking for service hours to offer their members. You can set up that they volunteer to help run the event or sign up teams. Another good source is recreational track teams, high school track and cross-country teams, and running clubs in the area. Runners are always looking for more places to run and if they get to help charity it gives them even more incentive.
3.You will also want to talk to local pizza stores, grocery stores and DJ places. Often they will offer to give free food, drinks and provide music for the event. This would be just another incentive to make the event fun for those who are giving up their time to run.
4.Make up fliers, an information sheet (this sheet would be for those who would want to volunteer to help run the event. You will want to let them know what kinds of jobs they may be doing and what time to be there), team sign-up sheets, and donation envelopes to your contacts.
5.Put an ad in the local newspaper to further advertise the event.
6.Have a set date that teams need to turn in their donation envelopes.
7.Once you have received team sign-ups, ask them to look for someone to sponsor their team or give set donations in increments of tens. If any businesses you have already talked to are interested in sponsoring a team put them on a list and let your teams know that if they are having trouble finding a sponsor to contact you.
8.Set up some rules for your event. How many people can you have on a team? Can the team all be running/walking at the same time or do you want it to be more like a relay?
The Event
All your planning has finally reached its end.
-On the day of the event make sure businesses that are offering food, drink or music know what time to arrive.
-Have tables set up for them to put their food and make sure you know all of the things your DJ needs.
-Have a chart made up with all of the teams on it where you can keep track of their laps or miles.
-Assign one event volunteer to each team. This volunteer is in charge of that team. Provide the volunteer with a clipboard, paper and pencil so that they can tally up team member’s laps. Have one person go around and collect these tallies as the run goes on and turn them into you so you can keep a running tab.
-Have team check-ins start about an hour before running time. Give each team a large paper number that they can attach to their clothing when they check in. When all of the teams have checked in explain to them what they need to do to make sure all of their laps are marked down. The best way is to tell them they will each have a volunteer. The volunteers will be lined up around the track. When you pass your volunteer on the track yell out your team number so they can mark it down.
-At the end of your run have the DJ announce the winners of the big prizes and if possible provide a small bag with coupons and other small gifts (maybe you can persuade a T-shirt company to make T-shirts for the event for little or no cost) to all the participants.
-Within the next couple of business days you will need to call the businesses that sponsored teams to let them know how far the team ran and how much their donation should be.
-After all the donations have arrived the businesses that helped you, and organizations that volunteered would probably like to know how much money the event earned for the charity. Send out a postcard with the total amount earned, and if you plan on doing the event next year let them know that you hope they can be involved again.
**This fundraiser can also be done on a much smaller scale; if you are doing it for a school the school could easily offer their facilities. You can talk to the PTA and have them provide snacks for sale, and the students will make up them teams.
