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And its true. We do. And there are many reasons why we do, ranging from “we think it’s the right thing to do” to, “many of us live in the area and our children and families will use the organisation” to, “it’s a sensible bit of marketing that might make people more likely to use the firm”.
Whatever the reason, it works for us and it seems to work for the many organisations that we help - you can see a list on our website:
But although we do try to help as many organisations as possible, it is not possible to help everyone and we receive more requests each year than our sponsorship fund can help. This creates a problem - who should we support and why? And what are the implications for supporting one request and not another?
These questions become even more relevant in recessionary times as, inevitably, sponsorship budgets are looked at more carefully at the same time as other avenues by which, for example, sports clubs or art organisations can obtain funding are cut.
This issue was highlighted recently when we received a request from a local under 8s youth football team for some sponsorship support. The club had come up with a new idea to try to raise the £400 to purchase a new kit by selling raffle tickets at £50 each to a number of local businesses. The successful ticket would then “win” their name on the team’s kit for the year.
We bought our ticket and awaited the result. Some weeks later, we were told that, despite promises from other businesses, we were the only organisation to have actually bought a ticket and the club needed more money. We have managed to find some extra funds to help the club buy the kit and so it seems that the story may have a happy ending; the children will get their new football kit and, hopefully, word of mouth will be positive about the firm.
But, of course, with only finite marketing budgets, some future requests may have to be turned down and this illustrates the problems of trying to help as many organisations as possible in these difficult times.