So it's official, we got the letter to ask for donations for the Chinese Auction. I volunteered to organize, so here goes. As you know from my haflas, I'm a Chinese Auction basket whore. I love it, I think it's fun, and the buzz it creates at the hafla is always awesome.

Here's the difference for this event.
1 - At the haflas, we advertise it as an Arabian Auction, because the baskets are bellydance themed. At this event, I feel that we should keep the baskets as appealing to the general public as possible, because in contrast to our haflas, the majority of our ShiCu audience are not bellydancers. Hence, we keep the name Chinese Auction. I'm not saying a few bellydance-ish baskets aren't welcome, by all means. But I feel the majority of the choices should appeal to everyone and anyone. We want people to buy lots of tickets.
2 - At my haflas, I buy 90% of the baskets out of my pocket. Usually, I spend about $300 on baskets, and generate about the same amount in ticket sales. In other words, the way I've done it in the past is not a huge money maker. I mostly do it because the crowd loves it and I enjoy doing it. The difference here for this event is that we will be not be buying/making our own baskets, we will be asking for donations only, so all the money from the tickets can go straight to charity.
3 - I feel that the baskets need to be really exciting for this type of event. This is not a hafla. This is a charity benefit, where people will be dressed up, wandering around with a glass of wine and a wallet to spend money. We want them to drop that money towards the cause. The more exciting the basket, the more tickets they will buy. We need to think big, special, and unique, but something that appeals to everyone. We want people crossing their fingers that they will win that basket, in fact, we want them to put several tickets in just one basket. Plus, the more baskets, the better. I'm shooting for at least 20.

We're coming up close on this event, and in order to secure 20 phenomenal baskets, I'm going to need some volunteers to help collect donations. Even if you volunteer to secure just one basket, that is a huge help. Volunteers need to contact a business, really talk up the event and the CAUSE of the event. We need to give them the official letter so that they can write off their donation at tax time. We need to give them more than the incentive of "it's for a good cause". Just a warm fuzzy feeling isn't enough for some people. We need to offer free advertising for their business through either listing their name as a sponsor in the program, or setting up a table at the event where they can place business cards or promotional materials. We also need to not be afraid to ask for a big donation, and to get them to commit to creating the basket and picking it up in time for the event.

Listed below are some of the ideas that I have come up with. I'll number them.......if you see an item that you really want to do, please list that number and state that you will volunteer. If you have connections to these businesses, all the better. If you have more suggestions, I'm all ears!