Category: Fundraising

"Empty Bowls" Food-Share Fundraiser is THIS Weekend - don't miss it!

11/12/2018

Each year, John Gear Law Office helps sponsor an important event for Salem, the "Empty Bowls" fundraiser put on by Willamette Art Center to raise funds for Marion-Polk Food Share. These two nonprofits team up to give you the opportunity to buy gorgeous things, lovingly made and finished by all-volunteer potters, with all the proceeds going to support the food bank that fights hunger in the Salem area all year round.

Make out your gift lists for the holidays and maybe for all 2019 as well -- friends, family, parents, kids, teachers, coworkers, you name it -- there are so many beautiful, one-of-a-kind things that there is sure to be a perfect gift for everyone you know at Empty Bowls, and you can help boost the total raised to fight hunger in Salem to over $200,000.

Willamette Art Center is on the State Fairgrounds, use the Silverton Road (Yellow) Gate. The event is Saturday and Sunday, November 17 and 18.

The Willamette Art Center hosts the annual Empty Bowls Benefit sale benefiting Marion-Polk Food Share.Saturday, November 17th, 2018 from 9AM to 5PM
Sunday, November 18th, 2018 from 12PM to 4PM

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More new titles available for loan to nonprofit leaders

5/16/2014

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I make my reference library on nonprofit governance and fundraising available for free loan to nonprofit boards and executives -- click the image above to go to my library catalog, where you can browse the many titles (look for the tags that interest you to sort through the 300+ titles; you can start with fundraising and nonprofits).

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Charities to Avoid

12/14/2012

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I'm skeptical of any bright-line rule that says that a nonprofit is no good because it spends too great a percentage of its revenue on administrative overhead. In fact, what I tend to see is the exact opposite: nonprofits that starve their administrative side in an effort to please the raters, which only sets them up for terrible problems of the gravest sort, including embezzlement, failure to find or retain good people, employment and wage claims, etc. The bottom line is that nonprofits are small businesses, and running small businesses is not easy, especially newer and smaller ones. So bright-line cutoffs are usually to be taken with a big grain of salt.

Ok, that said, here are some outfits that require a charitable interpretation of the word "charity" just to be considered as one. In other words, these aren't close -- these are the stinkers that cause good nonprofits such problems, because when the public gets a whiff of these stinkers, all nonprofits get a bad name. The best thing to do with this list is check it before you write your end-of-year gift checks -- and make sure you avoid these outfits. I'll just give the top three -- download the full list of 20 below.

Organization                                                     Average Annual                                  Percent Spent
                                                                                    Expenditures                                     Charitable Cause

Law Enforcement Education Program             $2,299,994                                     2.7%
Troy, MI

Shiloh International Ministries                              $846,340                                                     3.2%
La Verne, CA

American Medical
Research Organization                                         $783,217                                                     4.2%
Sarasota, FL

(I'm pleased to note that there are no Oregon nonprofits among this "Worst 20" list, although sad to see several in Everett, Washington.)

attorney_generals_20_worst_charities_2012.pdf
File Size:	100 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

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SALEM HARVEST: A very worthy local cause that's fun and delicious for you too

7/3/2011

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Salem Harvest is a gleaning project where local folks go and help farmers and orchard growers make great use of their excess or crops that would be lost because of timing or harvesting problems -- you split what you harvest with Marion-Polk Food Share, so you not only have fun in and around Salem throughout our beautiful Willamette Valley summer and fall, you also get to bring home delicious, freshly harvested food at the peak of its flavor and quality, all while sharing the bounty with less fortunate folks who depend on Food Share food boxes. Salem Harvest is a great program, and I am delighted to be able to support such a worthy cause.

Thanks to all the clients who, since last October, have been coming for help with their legal issues at John Gear Law Office, LLC, I was just able to go to the link mentioned below and donate the funds needed to buy one of the tall orchard ladders. I hope you will consider joining me in supporting such a worthwhile project. Here is the text of their latest e-newsletter for members and friends. Note that the donation link works, and it's easy, and makes you feel good.
===================================================================
     Thanks to the generosity of a commercial cherry grower just outside of Salem and our ongoing partnership with Farmers Ending Hunger, Salem Harvest will be kicking off the 2011 season with Farm Harvest Parties for picking cherries in July. You will receive an email soon with more information about the harvest party dates and times.

     In the meantime, here is some important information that you need to know for the 2011 Season.

     Harvest Parties: The Fastest Way to Find Out
The fastest way to find out about new harvest parties is to subscribe to the Salem Harvest blog, or follow us on Facebook or Twitter. We’ll use the “New Harvest” apple icon in our blog and on Facebook to announce that a harvest party has been posted on our harvest parties sign-up page.

     Why are subscribing to our blog or following us on Facebook or Twitter faster than our email notification system? It’s simple: we can announce a harvest party posting on our blog, Facebook and Twitter all at once, and the information is sent instantaneously to our followers.

     In contrast, our automatic email software, which we use to send all our registered pickers notices about harvest party postings, is limited to 200 emails an hour as an anti-spam precaution.   Since we have over 1450 registered pickers (with more registering each day), some pickers don't receive the message until hours later (and sometimes after the party has already filled up). We rotate how we send out the notifications to ensure that the same people don’t always get notices first or last, but it is always going to be faster to learn about harvest party postings on our blog, Facebook or Twitter.

     Of course you can always check the harvest parties page whenever you like to see if new harvest parties have been added. You can find the harvest parties page at http://salemharvest.org/harvestlist.php

     You can find our blog at http://www.salemharvest.org/blog and our Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/salemharvest. You can also follow us on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/salemharvest.

     Ladder Campaign
     As you may already know, many of the crops that we harvest require the use of ladders. When ladders are needed, we encourage pickers to bring their own ladders from home. The standard four-legged step ladder that most of us use at home often does the trick. However, a tripod orchard ladder is much more stable on uneven ground. Salem Harvest has five wooden orchard ladders that we bring out to harvest parties. You may have seen them or had a chance to use one if you picked at cherry, plum, pear, or apple harvests last year. They are very handy, but as they are made of wood, they are showing their age. Moving them can be cumbersome because of their weight and the potential for splinters. We would like to replace them with lightweight aluminum orchard ladders and add more to our inventory, and we are asking for your help. The more ladders we have in the orchard, the more fruit we can all pick, and the more we can donate to those in need (and take home to our own families for free).

     This season we will be raising funds for new orchard ladders. We have negotiated a wholesale price, and we would like to raise enough to purchase 10 to 15 aluminum orchard ladders of varying heights (6'-14') at a cost of $80 to $170 each. The goal for our ladder campaign is $1800.   A donation in any amount, be it $5 or $50, would be greatly appreciated. You can donate now on our web site. Thank you for your support!

     Streamlined Check-in & Donation Process
     We have two key changes to our Harvest Party process that we think you'll like:

     First, this season when you sign up for a harvest party, you'll be asked to check a box agreeing to the terms of our release from liability forms before your name can be added to a harvest party roster. This means no waiting in line at a harvest party to sign those orange and blue forms!

     Secondly, at Farm Harvest Parties, we will not be weighing containers or total pounds picked by harvesters. We will simply weigh the donated amount once we take the entire haul to Marion-Polk Food Share. This will speed things along. Pickers will still be asked to eyeball their donation half (or more if you're feeling extra generous). But we'll dispense with the time consuming weighing of empty and full containers. We still hope to have a small scale available at many Farm Harvests for folks to check out how much they picked for the fun of it (or in the spirit of friendly competition.)

     This change does NOT apply to Backyard Harvests-- these are the tiny harvests with just 1-10 people harvesting at a private residence. We'll still weigh produce there because we take those donations directly to a food pantry which does not weigh our contribution. (MPFS's warehouse does weigh our donations-- using a forklift on a giant scale usually!)

     Happy Harvesting!
     -- Amy Barr, Interim Project Manager/Volunteer Coordinator
Salem Harvest,    www.salemharvest.org            www.facebook.com/salemharvest        www.twitter.com/salemharvest

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Notes from the Underground (of nonprofit fundraising)

1/25/2011

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Lots of interesting material at the Mid-Valley Nonprofit Network's (part of the Nonprofit Association of Oregon) panel discussion on "Board Fundraising: Lessons from the Field" today. Here are a few excerpts from notes I made from the discussion by the facilitator and panelists:

"The ask isn't an ask ... It's giving people an opportunity to join you in making something good happen."

For most groups, getting better at fundraising and raising the level of board involvement and ownership of fundraising is the single best answer to Steven Covey's "7 Habits" question about "What's the most important thing I could be doing right now?" Q: How Does It Happen? (successful board leadership on fundraising): A: (1) Entrepreneurial zeal - you need to be hungry (2) Board commitment; (3) Making sure everyone has passion for the cause.
Q: How do you get board members to be passionate? A: You don't ... You can't make others be passionate. But you can share your passion, such as by sharing stories about the difference you make at board meetings, "putting faces on the spreadsheets." Also, remember to treat board members like the donors that they are - meaning to include them in any of your volunteer recognition events.
BOARD ROLE IN FUNDRAISING:
Not just planning events, but also showing up and participating in them. Donors expect to see and meet board members at events, participating as hosts. E.g., board members invite friends to their houses for dinner and drinks ... Then do 45 minutes and a few words from an ED, leave gift envelopes around casually. The board member's story about why they love it is more compelling than the ED's. Why? Because the board member isn't paid, and "people give to peers who have given."
Successful fundraising doesn't flow directly from emphasizing fundraising, it flows from other key attributes of a successful organization, especially a thought-out board development program, so that you become the kind of nonprofit that has a waiting list of people who want to help. Every board member has to be a steward for the organization, protect the mission of the group, and represent the group to the world. (See Marion-Polk Food Share's prospective board member questionnaire.)
When you consider a new prospective board member, you must clearly articulate the commitments, including attendance and how much they are expected to raise or give. If the situation changes, you can ask the member to resign if they can't fulfill their commitment.
Q: What is the role of strategic planning in Fundraising? A: For donors, it's a deal breaker if you don't know where you're going. You have to have your own fiscal house in order, which is what convinces people to give.
"Don't talk about what we do, talk about the difference we make."
Q: How do you retain and increase donor support? A: Let people know the difference their gift made. Start with a donor perspective: why do they give, what do they want from giving.
Idea: get the board out of the asking business and into the thanking business.
Concentrate on giving donors three to five touches (contacts, calls, letters, events) in between asks, otherwise people start to feel like an ATM for you.

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"Empty Bowls" Food-Share Fundraiser is THIS Weekend - don't miss it!

More new titles available for loan to nonprofit leaders

Charities to Avoid

SALEM HARVEST: A very worthy local cause that's fun and delicious for you too

Notes from the Underground (of nonprofit fundraising)

Subscribe to get occasional emails from John Gear Law Office.

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