Rainbow Trust Children's Charity raised over £249,000

Who

Rainbow Trust Children’s Charity supports families who have a child with a life-threatening or terminal illness.

When a child has a serious illness, family life is turned upside down and time becomes more precious than ever. Rainbow Trust pairs each family with an expert Family Support Worker who enables them to make the most of time together, giving them practical and emotional support, whenever they need it, for as long as is needed.

Prior Fundraising Challenges

The cost of living crisis is affecting Rainbow Trust Children’s Charity in multiple ways, both impacting its fundraising events and the added pressure it is putting on families caring for a seriously ill child.

Firstly, getting donors to pledge money is a bit harder as people are generally spending less. As well as this, the families supported by Rainbow Trust may be struggling to pay higher bills for electricity to run life-saving equipment at home, cover additional cost of transport needed to attend medical appointments and the increasing costs of their rent or mortgage. This enormous financial pressure is pushing families to their absolute limits. They are trying to cope with all the challenges that serious illness throws at them and, in some cases, are unable to work as they look after their life-threatened child.

Rainbow Trust anticipate an increase in demand from families as they struggle to manage alone. They have worked to integrate new ways of raising money and adding creative elements into their storytelling to strengthen the value proposition to donors.

This is where Givergy comes in, as our tools were required to ensure that the essential funds could be raised.

Event Highlights

The glamorous Race Night 2023 was attended by 200 guests at the popular Royal Windsor Racecourse in June 2023.

As well as a summer’s evening of racing, which was intended to improve awareness and engagement for the charity, Silent Auction and Donation features were used to incorporate strong elements of fundraising. Both worked well as the silent auction allowed proceedings to start one week before the event, whilst the in-room pledges worked well to capture extra donations from guests on the night, also allowing those who wished to donate anonymously an opportunity to do so. The ‘buy it now’ also allowed guests to donate an hour, day or year of support whilst they were scrolling through the silent auction. To achieve a successful amount of in-room bids, Givergy supplied 20 tablets for the event.

The charity also uses Givergy Unlimited, which made it simple and affordable for a variety of giving features to be incorporated into the event. This also meant that a mixture of attendees and those who could not make it could all donate, allowing maximisation of the giving process.

Result

In total, this event raised £249,000!

Givergy solutions contributed to the final figure in a couple of ways. The silent Auction actual amount raised was £29,300 and the Pledge actual amount raised was £7,855. A further £8,540 was also raised from Buy Now items.

Top Tip:

• It is essential to know your niche if your donors are interested in a particular area.
• Don’t go too low with the starting bids, as this can sometimes put people off. By being competitive, you encourage quick and dynamic bidding wars, as sometimes guests don’t want to bid all night, and interest can be lost.
• Always use strong visuals alongside both pledge and auction items. This should be done in terms of storytelling for the charity and also the prize on offer to ensure maximum interest can be obtained.