How NOT to raise money for your charity

[Seshat]

On the topic of gifts being 'not good enough'...

I volunteer for a small regional animal shelter. Most of our animal food is donated from the local community, and the donations are greatly appreciated.

However, sometimes we have elderly/disabled people who want to help, but are unable to come to the shelter. We'll gladly drive out to take their donation, because we appreciate the intent and the effort.

However, if their donation is a couple of tins/a small bag of food, we've usually spent more in fuel & staff/volunteer time to get to them than the donation is worth. The animals would have been better off with us spending the fuel money on food & the time directly on animal welfare.

We never tell the donor that. For all we know, they've scraped together for weeks to be able to help the poor little doggies. But their donation would honestly do more good as coins dropped in the Guide Dogs donation box in the supermarket. (It wouldn't get to us, but it'd get to a worthy cause.)

If anyone happens to have a miracle handy, I'd love for every donor to be able to just-know where and how their donation is going to do the most good for their cause!




Off-topic addition:
If you're donating food to an animal shelter and can afford the good stuff, get specialist food for pregnant or nursing animals. People keep surrendering their dog/cat because 'she got pregnant and we can't keep her'.
Other specialist foods (elderly, young, tooth-cleaning, weight-loss, etc) is also in short supply. But the pregnant mothers or recent litters are the most common special need.
And THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to everyone who donates time, money, effort or stuff to good causes.

[Knifeman]

I only give to charities that take non-money donations, like the Lekemia Society. They always take a donation of clothes and usually we have a bag.

[CrazedClerk]

I only give to charities that take non-money donations, like the Lekemia Society. They always take a donation of clothes and usually we have a bag.

I am the same way. I would much rather donate either physical objects that could help or my own volunteer time over giving money. There are only a very select few charities I donate any money to.

And about the post that started this thread. There are many corporations who cannot make store level decisions on donations. My games store was that way, even if we wanted to, we couldn't do it without approval. If I were canvassing for charity, I'd stick to the smaller local/regional shops instead.

[Shironu-Akaineko]

Off-topic addition:
If you're donating food to an animal shelter and can afford the good stuff, get specialist food for pregnant or nursing animals. People keep surrendering their dog/cat because 'she got pregnant and we can't keep her'.
Other specialist foods (elderly, young, tooth-cleaning, weight-loss, etc) is also in short supply. But the pregnant mothers or recent litters are the most common special need.
And THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to everyone who donates time, money, effort or stuff to good causes.

I got my baby operated so we won't get stuck with tons o puppies and I'm not too keen on the abandoning thing. She's 10 years old going on 6 months old. Immature but full of energy.

On the other hand, I got a coworker who let her male poodle boink her female shitzu and they got her first litter of Pootzus. She says they're going to sell the puppies for 150$ each to the petshop and I suggested they could use 90$ of it to spay or neuter (whichever) the shitzu. Her reply? "Nah, dad'll do something else with the money."

Yeah, she really expects the petshop to buy pootzus at 150$ a pup everytime. Hope her shitzu enjoys the shortened life span.

[BusBus]

At work, we have an annual charity campaign. I have run it the last two years. I have donated to it the last three years. The first two years, my donation was one of the top three in the office. This year, I had to scale it down. The second year I donated, I got a letter from the charity asking that I donate more than the previous year. I donated the same amount. This year, I got the same letter, asking that I donate more (like 25% more). I donated less. Then I got a follow up email asking why I hadn't donated. I told them that I had donated. Turns out that because I didn't donate a big sum this year, I didn't make some list and they wanted to know why I didn't donate that much. They also wanted me to ask people who didn't donate this year, but donated last year, why they didn't donate. Jesus Tap Dancin' Christ! That is none of their business!

I feel really put off by this organization. The money you give is apparently not good enough. Donating to charity is a personal choice. It is none of anyone's business who I choose to donate to and why. I will probably stay away from it this year.

[BookstoreEscapee]

On the other hand, I got a coworker who let her male poodle boink her female shitzu and they got her first litter of Pootzus. She says they're going to sell the puppies for 150$ each to the petshop and I suggested they could use 90$ of it to spay or neuter (whichever) the shitzu. Her reply? "Nah, dad'll do something else with the money."

That poor dog. Though I do like the name pootzus Unless you're a serious breeder there is no excuse for not fixing your pet. It can do a lot more for your pets health than just preventing babies.

My friend lives in a 2-family house, she lives downstairs and her mom and siblings live upstairs. She has a female yellow lab, her sister has a male black lab, and her mom has a female bassett hound, and they all share the yard, and pretty much have the run of both parts of the house, as well. None of them were fixed. So last year the black lab and the bassett got together and there were 8 puppies (actually 11 but 3 died). They kept 1 puppy for her niece who is 6 now, and the rest they found homes for. I don't know if they have since been fixed or not. I hope they have.

On the PTA: They were usually the least demanding of those who came into the store looking for donations (and BN no longer does that on the store level either). Though I've never heard anyone throw a fit because they were told no. There is an organization that collects clothing in my area, if you've donated before they let you know when they'll be collecting and you can set a date for them to come and just leave bags out on the porch, so we use that opportunity to clean out the closets a couple times a year. We also usually get my mom a goat or some chickens or whatever through the Hiefer Project for Christmas.

[Shironu-Akaineko]

That poor dog. Though I do like the name pootzus Unless you're a serious breeder there is no excuse for not fixing your pet. It can do a lot more for your pets health than just preventing babies.

EXACTLY why I suggested the operation for the Shitzu. As you can see, despite working with her for a long time, I don't know the name of the pets, as she calls them "the girl dog" and "The boy dog". Right there, red flag. And she actually asked me "If they get stuck, does she get pregnant?"

YES!

So I'm kinda worried not just for the pup pootzus, but for the momma as well.

Very glad I got to Phantom in time before that neighboring dog got to her. He was trying to get to her the DAY before her scheduled operation.
Note that we've had complaints about her getting free (Miniature Sheltie) and yet, the local GREAT DANE/ PITBULL mix is free to roam the place.

He tried to gore Phantom but I smacked him on the head. He coulda easily bitten my head off but he ran away whelping. DON'T touch my dog.

[BookstoreEscapee]

Very glad I got to Phantom in time before that neighboring dog got to her. He was trying to get to her the DAY before her scheduled operation.

We were originally told to get my cats fixed at 6 months, but the vet said to do it at 5; I found out some female cats can get pregnant as early as 4 months ! They are brother and sister, not that they know that. Stripes was starting to get a little "friendly" with his sister by the time they were about 4 months. Luckily Stars wasn't interested and just swatted him away.

[angelkirie]

I interned at a local animal shelter/farm and every month there would be a donation from some little old lately that obviously had palsy because you could hardly read her handwriting. One dollar in an envelope. Every month. And every month a different volunteer would write her a handwritten thank you letter! Most of our cards were donated by local photographers that came out and took pictures of the animals, then had the pictures turned into thank you cards, so not only were they donating, they were getting their name/work out in the public eye. I love every single one of the staff and volunteers up there, it's one of the few charities I've seen run the RIGHT way. (www.pasadosafehaven.org if anyone is interested, can't resist a plug!)

BTW, non-profits have to keep their taxes as public record. My mom is a CPA and was offering her services as a donation to Pasado's, but before she would, she found this website that lists all of (at least WA state's) non-profits tax-records. You can see exactly how much each employee makes, and where all the money goes. Kinda handy when you're wondering where to donate. I wish I could remember the site....

[Seshat]

And every month a different volunteer would write her a handwritten thank you letter!

That's a REALLY good idea. On my 'sick' days when I'm still well enough to do some good, I have some time when I'm sitting and waiting for the phone to ring (freeing other people up for jobs), so I might write handwritten generic 'thank you's to be handed out when people give us stuff.

Nice idea. Thanks!

[Kiwi]

my family used to donate to alot of charities, $5 to each one ($100 total)...I cant remember( but I think it was a womens refuge) which one now called my mum and said that they only accepted donations over $30!!!!! so they didnt want our money

they actually turned down money.... she couldnt believe it!!! my brother and I as kids saved up a portion of our pocket money all year for charity and they didnt want our money. How heartless it that!

[Ree]

There's a walk being held locally in June to support breast cancer research.

Apparently, unless the participant raises a minimum $2,000, they can't participate.

See, I don't get that. I don't understand discouraging pledges of any kind.

If someone can only collect $100, that's still $100 they didn't have yesterday, and it's the business of that participant that they are actually going to walk 60Km for such a small amount.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

That's the sort of thing that suggests to me that they don't really need the money all that badly.

[Crosshair]

Wow, I hope that father got reported IMAPseudonym .

[RecoveringKinkoid]

IMAPseudonym, that's an awful story. I'm close to tears reading it, and I wasn't even there.

We like to imagine that the needy are always these saints that are just down on their luck, that they just need a little break, and would appreciate a little help. We like to imagine that we are helping good folks, people who "deserve" some neighborly concern. And while that is sometimes true, it's NOT true in a large number of cases.

About half the people you do anything nice for (be it bring them supper when they are strapped or holding the door for them at the market) appreciate and thank you. The other half resent and hate you for it. You will still do it, of course, because you know that YOU are a nice person, at least. But you don't always get to feel good about it, which is terribly sad, especially in a case like this.

The mom probably would have appreciated the fact that her children had a nice Christmas because of you. But she knew they wouldn't because of the pig she was married to. Probably what they got for Christmas was getting to see their mom beat up after you left.

Sometime people are in the hole because of their own choices. This guy was clearly one of these. No help for him...or the people he's dragging down with him.

What an awful situation.

We did the "giving tree" thing at my daughter's nursery. You know, you pull a tag off the tree with the age and gender of a needy child, along with what they want for Christmas. My family donated a bunch of stuff to that. But that was all anonomous. I don't know what child I gave to, and they don't know who gave them presents (these were children actually at the nursery that were needy). I like to think the child I bought for was happy with her gift, that her family love her and each other, and that I made her smile. I hope her family realizes somebody gives a damn, that help is for the asking. I dont' know if that's the case, but that's my hope.

I'm kind of glad I will never know the truth. I don't really want to know.