Ultimate fundraising ideas for your club or organisation

Fundraisers can provide a lifeline to many clubs – by bridging the revenue gap and allowing organisations to function effectively.

From raising funds for new dance mats to helping to pay for clubhouse renovations, the money raised can be used in a variety of ways to help improve your club or organisation.

So you can start planning your next fundraising straight away, we’ve put together this comprehensive list of fundraising ideas. From the obvious to the creative, we’re sure you’ll be inspired in no time.

Outside the box – quick and easy fundraising ideas 

• Smarties challenge – give parents and children a tube of Smarties and ask them to return the tube, filled with 20p pieces
• Pre-loved leotard sale
• Wear your PJs to the gym
• Movie and pizza parties
• Watching weeks and squad displays
• Coach challenge – set an ambitious, yet achievable fundraising goal. If the goal is met, the coach has to do an outrageous activity. It could be shaving their head, having to wear fancy dress – the possibilities are endless
• Gameday car wash
• Rent-a-Team – the team can be ‘hired’ to help with various tasks such as gardening, cleaning and much more
• Host a dance-off
• Create and sell club/team calendars
• Host a team picnic or BBQ
• Training night tasters for friends – bring a friend along for £5
• Car boot sales on match day or at events
• Spare change bucket
• Beat the goalie/penalty shoot out/dribbling challenges
• Break a world record party – for example, the most socks put on a foot in 30 seconds or the farthest distance to blow a pea
• Sponsored neighbourhood clean
• Reverse raffle – this turns the traditional idea on its head. How it works is that all of the losing tickets are drawn first, with the prize winners decided by a process of elimination
• Dunk tank – time to dunk those coaches and players!

What ideas do our Facebook community groups have for fundraising? 

Our community groups on Facebook are full of club owners and volunteers facing similar challenges to you. We asked them what they’ve done for fundraisers – here’s what they said…

LoveGymnastics community ideas

“We’ve done a few different things such as 20p in Smarties tubes, fundays, sponsored bounces, bake-offs, presentation evenings, and gymnasts teach the parents”. – Alex Row, Centre Manager and Head Coach at Waveney Gymnastics Club and our LoveGymnastics Community Ambassador.

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“The sponsored tumble and the Smarties challenges have been the most successful in terms of funds raised for our club.” – Rudi Wall, Owner at TJ Gymnastics Academy Boston.

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“Pre-loved leotard sale – gymnastics bring in any leotards that don’t fit anymore and donate to the club. We then sell them on, with proceeds going to new equipment for the gym. This was especially useful after the lockdown as lots of gymnasts had grown out of their leotards while not training over that long period.” – Erin Pennthomas, Senior Coach/Club Secretary at Vivace Gymnastics Club.

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“We’ve just done a raffle – gave every gymnast five tickets to sell; they then brought back the tickets sold and the cash. We asked local businesses to donate prizes and we made £1,000. By giving the gymnasts the tickets, or saved the time of staff/volunteers trying to sell them.” – Holly Elizabeth Laverick, Operations Manager at Penzance Gymnastics Club.

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“Watching weeks and squad displays are always money-spinners for us. Tombolas and raffles too. We’ve got an Easter disco coming up, a decorate an egg competition and a ‘guess the coach from a baby picture’ quiz. When it warms up, we’re looking at movie nights and possibly a sleepover in the gym.” – Benh O’Hara, Director at Barnsley Gymnastics Club.

LoveFootball community ideas

“We do a lucky 7’s every week. Seven premiership fixtures. You predict either a home win, an away win, or a draw. Get all seven right and you win the cash. If nobody wins, the jackpot moves up by £25.” – Neil Rooney, Club Development Officer at Catterick Garrison Football Centre.

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“Supermarket bag pack is always a favourite, footy cards, car washing (try picking a nice day), sponsored walk (luckily I was in the support car), we hired a small club room and put on a band and food and sold tickets, did a couple of car boots (good earners), making up hampers for Easter, Xmas etc, footy fun events wet sponge the manager and assistants, footy shoot outs and barbecues. We did all of these and raised some serious money to fund the team’s trip to Barcelona. We’ve had some good laughs together, great times.” – Tony Orwin at Clifton Rangers JFC.

LoveSwimming community ideas

“Sponsored swims are always available but can be a bit samey. We did propose a sponsored committee 50m free showdown, which went down well, especially as some of the committee members aren’t actually swimmers. I think it’s all about creating community and a sense of spirit.” – Clive Marquis, Co-founder of South Downs Trojan Swimming Club and our LoveSwimming Community Ambassador.

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“My swimmers did a virtual swim to the Isle of Wight during the lockdown. They did either 4,000 strokes on a bungee in a garden pool or a dry land pulley. We raised £3,500 for the club.” – Graham Cawte, Head Coach at Bassett JSF Swimming Club.

LoveDance community ideas

“In the past, we have done many different fundraisers, including film evenings, pamper evenings (facemasks, older girls doing the younger children’s nails etc), window decoration colouring-in competitions, Halloween disco and tap-a-thons.” – Emily Redding, Owner at Emily Redding Dance Academy and our LoveDance Community Ambassador.

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“I’ve done bingo nights, dance-a-thons, and bake sales to raise funds.” – Kyla-Jade Anderson, Dance teacher at Emily Redding Dance Academy.

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“Pyjama week!” – Lucy Kind, Owner of Lucy Kind Dance Academy.

Make fundraising easy with LoveAdmin

LoveAdmin’s software helps to make fundraising easy. From quick email campaigns to a shop where preloved merchandise can be sold. With the click of a button, you can let people know about your fundraising events, and collect donations.

As well as handling ticket sales, the software lets you send emails and texts to your members to help increase engagement.

QR scanners enable your ticket holders to access your fundraising event easily because they are built into the software. With location tools, you can even quickly identify where your members live based on their postcode, making choosing a venue for your event simple!

Now that you have your fundraising ideas, you need to put them into action. Discover 9 easy tools and resources for quick and easy fundraisers.