How Kiwanis clubs get items donated

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

Write down who knows whom

A service club's advantage is decades of individual relationships with the town's businesses, and its recurring failure is that this lives in members' heads. Build the list at a meeting, assign each business to one member, record the outcome, and keep it for the year after that member stops attending.

Then send the students

The move that distinguishes Kiwanis procurement. Two students in pairs with an adult, approaching businesses to fund something at their own school, converts unusually well — and it is the leadership experience the programme exists to provide.

• Advisor approves first; students never solicit alone
• Give them a one-page leave-behind and one rehearsal
• Assign them businesses the members do not already have relationships with, so the two efforts add rather than overlap
• Have them write the thank-you notes, which is why donors renew

The order

3. The club's own suppliers

The venue, the caterer, the pancake supplier, the printer, the insurer. Commercial relationships with the club that are rarely asked.

4. Schools and their communities

Where the club funds backpacks, books or playgrounds, the school is a partner with its own channels. Ask it to share the auction with families.

5. Other service clubs

Reciprocal donation and promotion at no cost to anybody.

6. Past signature event attendees

Where captured — which is the argument for the sign-up sheet at the breakfast.

7. The wider community

Standard, and last.

Give everybody the half page

What the club funded last year with counts, what this auction funds and what one unit costs, that nothing identifying may be said about any child helped, which entity receives, and whether donations are deductible — accurately, which requires knowing the club's own status.

Timing

• Twelve weeks — advisor approached; entity and split settled in writing where students are involved
• Ten weeks — relationship list built at a meeting and assigned; members contribute first
• Eight weeks — members work their assignments; students work theirs
• Six weeks — club suppliers, schools, other clubs
• Four weeks — past attendees and community
• Two weeks — catalogue closed; student items checked with the advisor
• Signature event — bidding closes

Work around the school calendar as well as the club's. Students are unavailable during examinations and in the summer, which is exactly when a club might otherwise choose to run.

General information, not legal or tax advice for your club. Charitable status, account separation and the rules governing sponsored youth programmes come from your own constitution, your district and the schools involved — check before fundraising.

Committee structure: committee and volunteer roles.