Many of the benefits grabbing the buzz — and the bodies — these days are those planned by the young professionals who come to the table with fresh ideas and no fear of taking chances with themes and locations that never would have flown in their mothers’ day.
Formats that were popular a decade ago — cocktail hour/silent auction, seated dinner, speaker, live auction and dancing — haven’t vanished and certainly still have their place. But just as the new group of planners calls event settings “venues” rather than “locales” and refers to caterers, florists and musicians as “vendors,” they’re rethinking the approach to raising money.
Dinner and dancing in a parking lot? That’s where the AMC Cancer Fund had its 2011 Dinner in White. The location that was kept secret until one hour before the start time, when text messages and e-mails were sent to the 250 who’d purchased the $50 tickets.
Gather at a Centennial Airport hangar with a suitcase packed because you might be jetting off that very night for a Napa Valley weekend? Nearly 400 people did last summer, and the sponsoring SaddleUp! Foundation is going to do it again — on Aug. 17, in a larger venue.
Ride a mechanical bull, “milk” a plywood cow or vie for the arm-wrestling championship? Sure thing, had you been one of the 350 city slickers who’d gone country last fall at ASCENT Foundation’s Urban Cowboy, a $60-a-ticket party that raised $15,000 for Sewall Child Development Center.
Today’s benefit planners would rather trade their iPads for manual typewriters than subject their friends to something that involved expensive tickets, assigned seats for dinner and a program that stretched past the 10 o’clock news.
“The emphasis today is getting people in and out quickly,” says Dave Dixon, marketing and sponsorships director for the Cherry Creek Shopping Center, vice chairman of the Denver Kids board and past president of the Denver Active 20/30 Children’s Foundation. “We’re sensitive to people’s time and how valuable it is.”
He likes the happy-hour gatherings where admission is free, refreshments are subsidized and a voluntary “ask” is made at some point during the proceedings. “The name of the game is to get the people in the door so that they can network and enjoy themselves while learning something about your cause. The happy-hour events eliminate the hurdle of high ticket prices, but they do raise money and help get people involved.”
“People give in different ways now,” adds AMC Cancer Fund spokeswoman Brianna Firestone, “and $50 donations do add up.”
Jim Guttau, whose public relations firm helped mobilize the troops for Urban Cowboy, agrees that 25- to 40-year-olds are eager to be philanthropic, but not if it means being bored silly.
“Young professionals aren’t afraid to take risks, especially when it comes to innovative fundraising events,” Guttau says. “Our ‘naked’ sushi bars at a CultureHaus Banner Event a few years ago is a perfect example. We knew it was risky, but people are still talking about it. In fact, we went through 1,500 sushi rolls in one hour, as people were lined up to see the spectacle that was naked sushi!” (The Japanese delicacy was served on reclining nude models, bodies covered with strategically placed foliage.)
“What I find interesting, and exciting,” he adds, “is that people my age aren’t afraid to try new approaches. If something doesn’t work, well, lesson learned.”
One thing they do do is spread the wealth around. The same group of friends may plan fundraisers together for years at a time, but chances are they’ll have a new beneficiary for each one.
ASCENT (A Socially Conscious Entity) was established in 2002, and has an 11-member board and 40 volunteers who choose each year’s recipient after reviewing requests for funding that small, mostly child-welfare-oriented nonprofits have submitted. ASCENT supporters have raised $235,000 thus far. Urban Cowboy 2012 will benefit YouthBiz.
No event will succeed if no one knows about it, and thanks to the ever-increasing number of social media networks, word spreads quickly. AMC’s Dinner in White is marketed largely through Facebook and Twitter, a strategy that has proved successful. “In 2011 we doubled the number of people who like our Facebook page, and 75 percent of them actually attended the benefit,” Firestone says. This year will be the third year for Dinner in White and the goal is to have 350 guests and proceeds above the $20,000 raised in 2011.
Executive director Adam Daurio is expecting 500 guests for this year’s SaddleUp! and Pack Your Bags: A Denver Suitcase Party, which will also be marketed primarily through social media. “We will print and mail save-the-date cards, but we had so much success with social media our first year that we’re going to stick with it.”
Receiving an Evite isn’t what surprised Marilynne Maxwell about the bid her 24-year-old granddaughter sent for a fundraiser in California last spring. What amused the 70-something Denverite was the choice of responses. Instead of boxes where invitees could check off the customary “yes” or “no,” this one offered the options of “stoked” and “bummed.”
“With that, I knew that the tide has turned. What was done in my day is now considered ‘no way’ and we’ll never go back.”
Joanne Davidson: 303-809-1314 or jdavidson@denverpost.com
Fun Fundraisers
Dinner in White Aug. 4, benefits AMC Cancer Fund
Location will be revealed via text message and email one hour before the party’s start. Chairwoman Katie Flannery promises it will be “even more fabulous than last year.” Tickets, $50, includes beverages, desserts and entertainment. Guests bring their own picnic suppers. 303-239-3339
SaddleUp! and Pack Your Bags: A Denver Suitcase Party, Aug. 17, benefits the Parker-based SaddleUp! Foundation’s equine therapy programs for special-needs individuals
Location is Mayo Aviation at Centennial Airport. Tickets, $150 ( less for young professionals), include one entry in the drawing to board a West Wing II jet provided by Chuck Latham Associates for a deluxe weekend in the Napa Valley that begins the night of the benefit. 303-788-1666
