Get Sporty with Tournament Fundraising

The weather is fine—just the reason to take your fundraising outdoors and make it active. Theme your charity drives around a sport, such as golf, tennis, baseball or even beach volleyball—is an ideal way to raise money for charities with serious sports contenders as the draw!

If you decide to take on the role of tournament director yourself, you will be responsible for the following:

• Secure the venue
• Set the budget
• Organize a simple sign-up process
• Event publicity
• Creation of a rules guide
• And associated tasks to keep your sports tournament running smoothly

Organizing a charity tournament is not as big and stressful to do as it might sound. The good news is that there are volunteers out there willing to help you delegate tasks. So you’ll want to start off by taking committee volunteers to share in the responsibilities. Take to the web (social media sites like Facebook and Twitter) and send out a ‘call for volunteers’ to gauge interest in your fundraising tourney. Once the interested parties present themselves, you can ask members to join a small of committee organizers to get things going. This of people will be your biggest supporters. Delegate a few to contact potential sponsors, recruit sports teams for the tournament, and help you with planning, logistics and budgeting as well as the following:

1. Determine what charity or cause your fundraising sports tournament will benefit

2. Decide what kind of sport you'd like to theme your fundraising tournament around. Individual sports are usually best for tournaments because they encourage participation of businesses or teams that might already play in recreational leagues together  (teams are harder to come by). If you know that baseball is popular in your community, sticking with a sport of interest will encourage more participation.

3. Organizing the details of the actual tournament, such as time, date and location. But first, step back and ask yourself:

• How big will our fundraising sports tournament be? For example, do you prefer a team tournament or a singles’ event?
• What is your ideal location? Second choice location? Third? If you have several choices, have a committee member make some calls to find out what each has to offer in way of space, facilities and etc, before choosing.

4. Put any necessary deposits down on your tourney location to ensure booking.

5. Marketing for your charity event should start as early as possible. Awareness is the best way to get athletes and sponsors signed up. You can spread word of your charity sports tournament via local news; flyers; community message boards; local organizations like churches, schools, fitness clubs, and at sporting events and recreational centers; and of course through social media. And finally, a special email list should be generated with contacts to the larger businesses in your area (you can attract players and sponsors) to discuss their involvement.

6. Determine the budget so you ensure you make adequate money for your fundraiser, of course. You need to decide if you will provide:

• Snacks and refreshments
• Team shirts
• Prizes to award the winners

The good news is that you can approach sponsors to donate refreshments, trophies and giveaways such as charity T-shirts, sunscreen, sunglasses, sports equipment and food.

7. Finding referees or an officiating crew may or may not figure into your budget. For instance, if you choose a favorite local sport those who are familiar with the sport, but can no longer play may volunteer. However, professional officiators may demand payment. Regardless, a crew to enforce the rules of the game will help make your day successful, promoting healthy competition and safety for participants. If you can’t afford the professionals, you can also contact the athletic directors at schools and colleges to seek volunteers from their student population. As an alternative measure that might save you some money, you might also download free software that can help judges (maybe those less familiar with the rules of the game) track your tournament results. If software is nowhere to be found, an old fashioned chalkboard or white board with erasable markers will do the trick.

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