How much can an alumni association raise with an auction?

Short answer: the cohorts you can actually reach, times whether advancement let you reach them.

Working it out from cohorts, not from "alumni"

The alumni body is a category. A class year, a chapter or an affinity group is an audience.

• Reunion-year classes in the window, which have volunteers and an anniversary
• Regional chapters and affinity groups — the band, the team, the paper, the department
• Alumni-owned businesses, reachable with a pitch nobody else can make
• The cost of what you fund locally: a scholarship, a student emergency fund, chapter programming

All of it is capped by one thing that is not a number: whether advancement will let you contact the list. Settle that before estimating anything.

What moves it

Advancement's permission

The ceiling on everything. An association that cannot email alumni is fundraising to whoever happens to see a post.

A reunion year in the window

A cohort with an anniversary, its own volunteers and a competitive streak against other classes: reunion auctions.

Affinity groups

The band, the team, the paper, the department. Frequently more cohesive than class years and reachable without the main list.

Alumni-owned businesses

Both a supply of items and a set of donors, reachable with a pitch nobody else can make.

Setting the goal

Name what it funds locally — a scholarship, a student emergency fund, a chapter's programming — and publish the figure. "Support the association" fails against the endowment question; "two scholarships for students from this county" does not.

Goal and budget mechanics: fundraising goals and budget.

General information, not legal advice for your association. Whether you are an independent organization or part of the institution changes who receipts, who owns the alumni data and who may use the marks — the advancement office and your own counsel decide how any of this applies.