Playing on a sports team is a positive learning experience for any individual. Children can benefit from learning how to work with others while gaining vital communication skills and engaging in physical exercise, while adults can find valuable friendship and community in the sports teams they join or support.
Whether you’re part of a football team, a hockey team, or even a bowling team, sports clubs often have upfront costs to contend with such as providing new kit for members and new equipment, or may need to make vital renovations to the club house where everyone meets. Taking part in tournaments costs money too, from travel and accommodation to food expenses. It means that sports teams often need help through money generated from fundraising events to so they can keep serving their community.
Here are some of our best sports fundraising ideas to help out your local team. Don’t forget to check out other sports fundraisers for inspiration.
Sports team fundraising ideas
1. Try crowdfunding
Crowdfunding is a popular and effective fundraising strategy that can give a huge boost to any sports team’s budgets. Starting an online fundraiser on a fundraising platform like GoFundMe to help out your local club can be done with a few simple steps.
Introduce your team: Create your fundraiser page, set a fundraising goal, and tell everyone all about your team. Go ahead, brag! Share past accomplishments, awards, or special team qualities with pictures and bios of the team members to help people feel connected to your cause.
Get the word out: Share your team’s fundraiser on social media platforms, tell people about it in person on game days, email supporters about your cause and start to collect donations online.
Share updates and photos: Make your fundraiser a one-stop-shop for all team updates and photos so your followers can keep rooting for you even if they can’t make it to a game. You can find tips for writing a fundraiser update here.
Show your appreciation: Give your supporters a big round of applause for their online donations. Send thank you emails and notes to show them how much their kindness and generosity means to you and the team.
Read Your Fundraiser Story: A Comprehensive Guide for more fundraising tips to help you get started.
2. Host a bake sale
Baking delicious cupcakes that you can sell on game days is an easy fundraising strategy for your club. Get your goods set up on the concession stand or have friends and family members help out by setting up a table with your homemade cakes and treats. Everyone who buys one will know the money is going to a good cause.
3. Make team merchandise
Sell team merchandise to fans to boost your fundraising campaign. You can print t-shirts or jerseys with the team’s logo and sell them in person at matches or through an online store. Add pictures of what is available to your donation page so people know they can support the team in different ways with a link to your online store.
Local businesses or non profits may be able to partner with your sports team through a sponsorship deal in return for having their logo on the team’s kit, too. If making t-shirts or jerseys isn’t possible, come up with creative ideas for merchandise you could make, like badges or flags.
4. Organise a car wash
Boost your club’s fundraising efforts by finding a local parking lot you can set up in, recruiting team members and other volunteers, and spreading the word that you’re doing a car wash. Make sure to promote your fundraising event on social media to reach as many local community members as possible, and and take pictures to update club donors and friends to show them how well the day went.
5. Run a high school field day
Hosting a field day at your local high school is a great fundraising idea for youth sports teams. You can set up softball competitions, races, and even raise extra money with a hit-a-thon to see how many times or how far people can hit a baseball. Ask local businesses if they can donate prizes for the winners, or contribute to raffle prizes with a discount card for their store or a gift card for a local restaurant.
See if other sports teams or local community members have any local memorabilia like a school sports program or a signed ball they would be willing to donate or sell and hold a silent auction on the day.
6. Host a movie night
If you’ve got a big enough club house to host a fundraising event, or a local restaurant your team always eats at that could let you host an event, then a movie night is a popular way to create a successful fundraiser. Either sell tickets or charge a small entry fee for people to attend, pick a film, and get watching!
You can always boost donations by selling popcorn and drinks, or even by selling raffle tickets for other fundraising events like an upcoming field day.
Teamwork makes the dream work
Sports team fundraising is a great way to get your group working towards a common end goal. Need new uniforms? Need to fund travel to the tournament? Crowdfunding is your team fundraising solution. If you haven’t already, start your fundraiser today.