Solarthon 2009 - Fundraising Tips

Raising money for a cause you care about can actually be a lot of fun. It's a great excuse to catch up with folks, and talk to them about renewable energy, climate change, and the importance of bringing together environmental and economic sustainability, particularly in the low-income communities hit hardest by the economic crisis. Remember, the purpose of this event is to raise both money and awareness, so every conversation, letter and email helps.

Here are a few resources and tips to make fundraising easier:

• Create a personal fundraising page at FirstGiving. You can customize the page and use it to send email to friends and family and track their donations. Once you've created the page you can also use FirstGiving's Facebook application to raise money over your Facebook network.
• Send a personal letter or email to let folks know why you care about renewable energy for communities in need. Here's a sample (in Microsoft Word format) to use as a reference, but your own words are the best.
• If you want to give prospective donors more information about where their donations are going, you can share statistics from our website to help quickly demonstrate GRID Alternatives' impact. For this project, we'll have over 200 community and industry volunteers installing 16 1.8 kilowatt solar electric systems. These systems will generate over $270,000 worth of clean, renewable power for low-income families over their lifespans, while eliminating over 800 tons of greenhouse gas emissions. We'll also be raising over $100,000 to help bring the benefits of solar to more low-income families throughout California, while helping spread the word that solar power is a practical, mainstream energy solution for all of our communities.
• Post a sponsorship flyer in your company lunchroom or community bulletin board, or circulate it around your office or community.
• Many companies offer donation matching programs that can double the value of your sponsors' donations - don't forget to ask them!
• Get creative! Check out this list of 125 fundraising ideas at AIDS LifeCycle, or make up your own. Remember, this should be fun!