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A Child's Desire has developed a great fundraiser selling Kidsafe ID cards to your local daycares and preschools. The profits can be used by any adopting family towards their adoption-related expenses.
A Mother's Love Adoption & Infertility Fundraising - Valerie Gagnon is currently helping people all across the country through fundraising to defray their adoption and infertility costs. The way the fundraising works is simple! All you would have to do is pass the flyers and catalogs around to family, friends, coworkers and neighbors. Anyone can assist you with your fundraiser. All orders are sent to Valerie for processing. Once the items are delivered you will receive your profit checks. She presently offers 41 different fundrasiers. There is a processing fee of $19.95, which includes the information and forms for 5 fundraisers plus 6 more fundrasiers of your choice.
Baby Bottle Campaign - Buy bottles in bulk (or get used ones donated) and design a paper flyer to go in each bottle telling about your adoption. Then distribute them to friends, family, businesses, churches, schools, daycares - whoever is willing to put their spare change in the baby bottle. Give them one month to see if they can fill the bottle and then collect them. One crisis pregnancy center that does this averages $20-25 per bottle so this idea can really add up! It's also a great way to get kids involved.Babysitting You can offer to babysit for friends and coworkers whenever they need you and take in a little extra cash with very little work or planning. You can also take babysitting to a whole new level and plan a night of childcare at a local daycare! You may need to use the daycare's employees but if not you can enlist the help of friends and family. Daycare centers have a ready-made base of parents so you can put up sign-up sheets and hopefully have a full house of children on your big night. Your expenses will be the food and snacks/juice and the workers if you need or choose to use them.
Bean Bags For Fundraising has custom bears that you can order for less than $4 per bear including shipping and the one-time set-up fee. They each come with a little shirt that can say anything you want, such as "I helped bring Kira home!" or "I Love Adoption". A great item for older siblings to sell who want to help bring their baby brother/sister home!
Benefit Fundraising I got hungry just reading about this English Toffee candy! What's even better is that all of their profits go to the Home for Good Foundation. What a great way for people to be able to support adoption in two different ways and get a wonderful bag of toffee too!
Casual Friday - Ask your employer if they would be willing to have a "casual friday" with the proceeds going to your adoption fund. Each person who participates will give $5 to your adoption fund and everyone gets to have a great day at work! This is a great way for a smaller business who may not have an adoption benefit to support your adoption.
Connect with Others - There are several groups and forums you can join online to getgreat new ideas everyday! To get you started try Fundraising for Adoption.
Crop 'Til You Drop - You scrapbookers know what I'm talking about, don't you! This is where you get together all of your friends and family that love to scrapbook (or want to learn!) and you have 6 or 8 glorious hours of no kids or husbands needing you, no phones ringing off the wall and no housework to call to you! This can be a great fundraiser since your costs can be minimal. You can have it at your house or a donated facility, serve soda and snacks, and even get some scrapping supplies donated from a store or consultant to use as giveaways! Saturdays work well and you can charge $10-20 per person.*Hint: Consider asking a scrapbooking consultant to come to your crop. She can demonstrate techniques, help people with their pages, sell her products and give you a portion of her sales!
currentfun.com Current is a well-known and reputable company, so this should be a good fundraiser for many people. You can sell through the catalog they supply or use the internet and let them order online. Either way, you keep 50% of the profits!
E-bay Many families have found that selling items they already have laying around their house is a great way to make some extra money and also get ready for their new addition! E-bay and similar sites charge a small fee per listing plus a small percentage of the sale price. There are also specialized sites that sell nothing but scrapbooking supplies, children's clothes, etc and some don't even charge a fee. Start by searching for "online auctions" or narrow your search if you have a certain category of items to sell (ie. scrapbooking supplies).
Free Web Page Search under "free website" on any search engine and you will find many providers to choose from. This is a great way to spread the word about your adoption and need for financing. You can even include a Paypal donation button for family and friends to use. You can also sell items on your site. Need some ideas? Consider making printed notecards that have a drawing from one of your children or a picture of their birth country on them to sell. Or maybe you have a talent you could feature on the site and take orders. Have an online sale of items you no longer need. Post pictures and prices and give it a catchy name like "Making Room for Rachel!" Then tell everyone you know!
Fundraiser Websites Take a look at Fundraiser Finder, www.fund-raising.com and Fundraising Deals for LOTS of ideas! You can search several different ways on these websites (by state, category, etc). They may help you find a great fundraiser - or spark your imagination to come up with one of your own!
Garage sale This is an oldie but a goodie! And there are several
options:
*Price everything and have an old fashioned garage sale.
*If you can't price everything consider putting up a poster about your child or their
birth country and a sign that tells everyone that the proceeds of this sale will go toward
your adoption. Then let people give what they want for your items. (If you have anything
expensive you may want to put a price on it.) This idea has worked well for youth group
and charity fundraisers and is especially good for those who have tons of "stuff" given to
them for the sale and wouldn't be able to price it all.
* Pay a fee and join in a community garage sale. These are usually indoors (no rain out!)
and they do all the advertising for you.
Green Thumb? Try a bulb fundraiser through Dutch Mill Bulbs. They are very happy to work with adoptive families. You will need to collect the money up front and send it in with your order but that will also earn you a little extra (5% I believe). You will receive 50% profit, no shipping charges, they will send you a free fundraising packet, they have a toll free number if you need help- this is a great program! Or maybe you already have a yard over flowing with plants. Why not try a plant sale? You can do this in conjunction with a yard sale or just focus on the gardening theme and have potted plants for sale, seeds you have saved, used gardening tools - anything a gardener would be interested in. This is a great way for family and friends to help by donating plants from their own yards, saving seeds for you, or donating those hedge trimmers they don't use anymore. You could also have produce for sale if you're over flowing with tomatoes or zucchini! Or sell your extra produce at a local market. This is a hobby that can really help your adoption "grow".
Heavenly Light Candles - This is a great company to use if a candle fundraiser sounds right up your alley! The owner, Trish, has agreed to give Affording Adoption families a Consulting Handbook, catalog and sample candle FREE OF CHARGE to help you get started! This is a great offer for those who are a little timid about starting a fundraiser or if you do not have the funds to buy one of her consulting kits. Feel free to check out their website and be sure to mention Affording Adoption when you contact her!
Kingdom Kids Adoption
Ministries Kingdom Kids Adoption Ministries are excited about what the Lord is
going to do in the lives of your family and your future child. They believe that a lack of
finances shouldn't prevent a child from being part of a loving family. They help families raise finances for
adoption through their adoption fundraising/grant program. Feel free to contact them with any questions. They
are available for phone calls from 9:30 to 3:00 PST.
Kingdom Kids Adoption Ministries
1417 N. Lincoln
Spokane, WA 99201
Phone: (509) 465-3520
KingdomKids@effectnet.com
Mystery Shopping You may not be able to pay your agency fee just by mystery shopping but shopping on someone else's dime could be beneficial for two reasons - you get to make an average of, say, $15 per "shop" AND you get to splurge on dinner, a movie, or whatever which you are probably not getting to do much of since you're working hard to save every penny! For ideas, check out the following website (beware of all the pop-up ads) - http://members.tripod.com/~m oneyline/Mystery_Shop.html
Recycling You've all heard about ink jet recycling by now, right? Go to www.empties4cash.com or www.cartridgefundraising.com for more details on how to raise money by collecting empty ink cartridges. A good program will provide free shipping of the cartridges and material to help your collection efforts. You may also want to consider recycling cell phones at Phone Fund and Old Cell Phone. The Cellfund Program even has a referral program where you receive 10% of the profits for anyone you refer to them.
Here's another idea to go with the recycling theme - why not have a recycling drive? People bring you their bags of cans and bottles and you take them to a nearby recycling center that pays you by the pound. This is a great way to earn a couple hundred dollars with very little effort.
Silent Auction This can be a great way to add to your adoptionfund and is the perfect fundraiser to let people help with. Friends and family can ask businesses to donate items, hang up flyers around town, help set up the day of the auction, and so on. Tip: try to have several "big" items donated before you spread the word so you can peak people's interest. And don't forget the door prizes! Many families do a dinner/silent auction and make between $500 and $2,000 but I know of one family who served over 300 dinners and had 40 auction items and they raised $5,600!
Start your own business! Okay, that may seem a littleintimidating but everyone has a skill or service that others need so why not try it? A number of people have set up a small business from their homes with the proceeds going into the adoption account. Take a look at The Mall, www.heartandseoul.com/helpinghands.html or www.celebrateadoption.com to see some great examples of what people are doing with their talents!
Other ideas.....
*Have a skating party to benefit your adoption at your local rink.
*If you live in the eastern half of the United States you can have a clothing drive with the American Clothing Recycling Company.
*Have a spa day complete with facials, massages and manicures (by professionals who are donating their services, of course). Charge $15-$25 per person and have a relaxing day dreaming about your child!
*Get your friends and family together and make a cookbook through Fundcraft or Morris Cookbooks.
*Save all of your change and put it in a jar. You will be suprised at how fast those coins add up and it's a painless way for your spouse, kids or even friends and extended family to pitch in!
*See how many days you can go without spending ANY money! This is like your own little fundraiser and is especially great for those who buy those little extras that add up faster than you think.
Have a fundraising idea to share? Let us know!
