Throughout my school years, I had a love-hate relationship with fundraising. I loved the goals, competitions, and rewards that could be met when our school hosted fundraiser events such as cookie dough sales and raffles. I loved getting to see the new academic or athletic equipment that would come with attaining these goals. It was always so much fun to see which class may contribute the most and who was leading. I even loved seeing what new programs the school tried in an effort to raise funds for different activities. Though I strongly disliked the route to all of this goal-crushing and pizza party winning. (Who didn’t want to win a pizza party back in the day?)
My shy self was terrified to ask friends, relatives, and complete strangers to buy candy bars, coupon books, or to sponsor me in a walk-a-thon. Though my competitive and giving side said “Go for it! Let’s spend all weekend knocking on doors!”. My mother spent hours driving me around so that I could, with as much courage as I could muster, knock on door-after-door in neighborhoods around town – soliciting the newest fundraising program. I always imagined that I was the only child terrified to do this, yet I still wanted to contribute and compete. Those thoughts come to mind as children now knock on my door and my kids participate in different programs.
I’m glad to see that fundraising has evolved and become more convenient and even more beneficial for everyone involved. It’s now so simple, that just by purchasing a gift card – I’ve contributed! Let’s chat about this easy and stress-free fundraising by ShopWithScrip. (It really is as simple as purchasing a gift card to your most visited retailer.)
Step one: I order a few gift cards from our school or the hosting organization. These gift cards are to places where I’m already spending our grocery money, or purchasing our clothes and Christmas presents. Being able to support fundraising efforts through ShopWithScrip relieves the pressure and time constraints of traditional fundraising and allows me to be supportive by purchasing gift cards to stores where I already shop.
Step two: I pick up my gift cards from the school/organization.
Step three: I shop. Simple! I love that most of the interaction can take place online and I’m helping our organization to raise funds through activities and spending that are in line with my already busy schedule.
The ShopWithScrip fundraising program is the largest gift card fundraising program in the USA. Scrip is fundraising while you shop®. Unlike other fundraisers where you have to devote time to selling products or asking for donations, with scrip, you raise money by purchasing gift cards on ShopWithScrip.com. These gift cards all have a rebate percentage on them, normally between 2 percent and 16 percent, which is the amount that will go directly to your organization when the card is purchased at face value.
Over the past two decades, ShopWithScrip has contributed to fundraising initiatives for over 30,000 organizations, raising over $570 million.
How to ShopWithScrip:
- Organizations sign up to become a ShopWithScrip customer
- Organizations earn money on the gift card purchases. This money goes towards organization’s fundraising initiatives.
- ShopWithScrip delivers the organization’s purchased gift cards.
