How choirs get items donated

For letter structure and follow-up, see how to get silent auction donations and the donation request letter template.

Start with the singers, twice

Once for the performance items — who will sing a telegram, who will do a party, who will teach — and once for what they do professionally.

A choir roster is a wide cross-section of a community and nobody reads it as a directory. Ask the question directly at a rehearsal and write down the answers; it typically produces half the catalogue in twenty minutes.

The order

2. The venue and its community

The church, school or hall you rehearse and perform in has its own congregation or membership, its own noticeboard, and frequently a willingness to donate use of the space itself as a lot.

3. The concert audience

Captured at the door, which is the point of capturing them. Ask the list directly with named examples of what is useful.

4. Other choirs and musical societies

Reciprocal promotion and donated items at no cost to either group. Also a source of performance swaps — your quartet at their event and theirs at yours.

5. Music retailers, teachers and instrument shops

Aligned, and their customers are your audience. Lessons, vouchers, instruments and accessories.

6. Businesses the singers use

Restaurants, shops and services where a member is a regular. A personal ask from a known customer is the whole method at this scale.

7. The wider community

Standard, and last.

Offer the programme advertisement in the same conversation

The move that distinguishes procurement here. A business asked for an auction item can also buy a programme advertisement, and the second is a commercial transaction rather than a donation — which some businesses much prefer.

Take both offers to every business and let them choose. Several will do both.

Timing

• Ten weeks — singers asked at a rehearsal, both questions; entity and receipting settled
• Eight weeks — venue community, other choirs, music retailers
• Six weeks — businesses the singers use, with the programme advertisement offered alongside
• Four weeks — the audience list and the wider community
• Two weeks — catalogue closed; every performance item cleared with the director for date and repertoire
• Concert night — bidding closes

Do not solicit in concert week. Everybody is rehearsing, the director is unavailable, and the singers who would ask are the ones on stage.

General information, not legal advice for your choir. Performance, recording, streaming and arrangement rights are specific and are decided by the rights holders and your own licences, not by custom — check before recording or selling anything.

Committee structure: committee and volunteer roles.