Remember the Ice Bucket Challenge of 2014? The charity campaign combined donating to potentially life-extending medical research with pouring a large bucket of ice water over one’s head during the month of August. Three years ago, the Challenge raised more than $100 million worldwide for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), but what did that money actually do? [More]
fundraisers
Prepare For Onslaught Of Facebook Friends Begging For Donations
By 3.30.17 — Updated: 5.9.17
If Facebook wants anything, it’s to keep you on the Facebook site for as long as possible. That’s why perhaps it’s not surprising that given the popularity of personal online fundraisers, Facebook is now entering that business, letting people raise money for medical expenses, funerals, education, or any other cause. [More]
Don’t Forget Free Cone Day At Dairy Queen Today
By 3.20.17
Looking for a cold treat and a way to celebrate the first day of spring? Today is Dairy Queen’s annual Free Cone Day fundraiser for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals. Anyone who asks will receive a free small vanilla cone, and can make an optional donation to Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals. [More]
Thief Steals Volunteer Firefighters’ Proceeds From Christmas Tree Fundraiser
By 12.20.16
While a thief with Grinch-like tendencies didn’t sneak into every home in Spring Lake Heights, NJ with a Christmas tree and steal them, what the thief did was still pretty mean-spirited. Someone broke into a garage at the firehouse and stole $1,000 that the local volunteer fire department raised in its annual tree sale. [More]
Facebook Letting Individual Users Set Up Fundraising Pages For Nonprofits
By 7.1.16
People who want to raise money for the causes they care about have another crowdfunding option: Facebook announced it’s expanding its fundraising feature for nonprofits to individual users. [More]
Michigan Lawmakers Want To Bring Back School Bake Sales
By 3.2.15
In an attempt to bring back that event many remember as a particularly sugary, joyous time at school, Michigan lawmakers have introduced legislation that would lift the current ban on bake sales, saying school groups are in need of such fundraisers to keep going. [More]
Factory Where Rosie The Riveter Worked Still Exists, Might Become A Museum
By 7.29.13
The World War II propaganda icon Rosie the Riveter was based on a real woman, Rose Will Monroe, who appeared in a government film about female factory workers. She worked at the Willow Run Bomber Plant in Michigan. After the war, the riveters returned to pink-collar jobs and to homemaking, and the Willow Run plant returned to making Ford vehicles until 2010. Now it’s about to be demolished…unless supporters can raise another $3.5 million to save part of the building and move an existing aviation museum there. [Associated Press] [More]
Oklahoma Tornado Survivors Need Your Help, Scammers Don’t
By 5.22.13
24 people are confirmed dead, and many are still missing after a massive tornado destroyed homes and lives outside of Oklahoma City. Don’t let yourself become an indirect victim of the natural disaster by giving money to a fake charity or social media account set up to take advantage of well-meaning and generous people who want to help. [More]
Donate To Diabetes Research, Get Four Frostys From Wendy’s
By 6.19.12
It could always be worse. Almost exactly a year ago, we shared a KFC promotion that donated part of the purchase price of a ginormous soft drink to type 2 diabetes research. You know, the kind of diabetes that is correlated with poor diet and exercise habits, such as drinking ginormous soft drinks. This year’s Wendy’s promo raises money for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, or type 1 diabetes–the one not correlated to poor dietary habits. Donate $1, and you get four small Frostys, cups of a sugar-laden dairy-like substance. One small Frosty contains 42 grams of sugar, if you’re wondering. That’s 10.5 teaspoons of sweetness, and kind of a weird item to be selling as a fundraiser for a disease that prevents patients from processing sugar correctly. [More]
Cold Stone Treats Only 'Free' If You Make A Mandatory Donation
By 9.28.11
There’s an annual event at Cold Stone Creamery outlets called the World’s Largest Ice Cream Social. Part of the chain’s September fund-raising drive for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, it’s billed as an event offering free ice cream during a three-hour period on a certain day. Melissa had put this on her calendar weeks in advance, because she’s on a budget, and hey: free ice cream! But she arrived at the mall to find employees posted at the Cold Stone door, not allowing anyone in unless they made a donation first. That’s not free, that’s a cover charge. Isn’t it? [More]
Man Who Torched Car To Save Home Ends Up In Court
By 3.24.11
A Utah man had a bold plan, which we told you about last year. His house was going into foreclosure unless he could come up with $21,638.02 to pay HSBC. So he announced to the world that he would burn his car and post the video online in exchange for donations. He raised about $15,000 and even sold $1,200 worth of advertising on the side of the car. He tried to work with local fire departments to get them to let him burn the car, to no avail. So he did it on public land and now he’s in court and getting fined, reports KSL. [More]
Chicago Music Fest Bum Rushes Paying Audience So It Can Prepare For Fundraiser Dinner
By 8.3.10
Ravinia, a century-old Chicago summer music festival, is getting hardcore about raising money. This year it sold tickets to a concert performance of songs by composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim, sung by Broadway veterans and played by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Sondheim is always a big deal for musical theater types, and the event seemed like a home run for both the fans and Ravinia–until the concert ended after 65 minutes with no encores, and the general admission audience was told to leave so that Ravinia could reward their core supporters with a gala dinner. [More]
Man Offers To Set Car On Fire To Save Home From HSBC Foreclosure
By 7.26.10
John admits on his blog that he’s responsible for falling six months behind on his mortgage. But once he got over his divorce and losing his adopted son and started trying to make things right, he ended up in loan modification limbo at HSBC. The bank never moved forward on any modification, and now he has to pay $21,638.02 today if he wants to keep his house. Logically, he’s offering to burn his car and post the video online in return for donations. [More]
Ohio Strip Club Raises Money For Haiti
By 2.9.10
If you visited the strip club Marilyn’s on Monroe in Toledo, Ohio, last weekend and paid the cover charge for their “Lap dances for Haiti” evening, congratulations, you helped the club raise nearly $1,000 for a local charity that’s trying to send a container of relief supplies to Haiti. Oddly–as you already know if you attended–there were no actual lap dances because they’re illegal in Ohio. The local charity says they need $5,000 to send the supplies, but luckily two other area strip clubs are staging their own fundraisers later this month. [More]
