fundraising

Hi Kiwi-family
When I was well into planning my first Camino a friend asked if I was looking for sponsorship. The answer was 'no': but I thought about it and finally thought - 'Why not, I am walking anyway, and fund raising on the side won't hurt!' As you can read here -
http://walktocompostela.blogspot.co.uk/ ... 9:00-07:00
I set a target of £500 and finally raised £2000.
So, I would say - go for it. To save any hassle it is easy to set up an account with an on line charity support group e.g. "Justgiving" - http://www.justgiving.com/en/how-justgiving-works
No problem if you set it up in good time, you can give the link to your friends and relax!
I personally would not want to be handling a lot of sponsorship forms and money.

Blessings
Tio Tel

I raised money for a local hospice for the terminally ill in my home town when I walked the Ingles. It was the suggestion of a pub landlord friend of mine. Out of mischief I set up two sponsor events, one in his pub and one in another. The resulting competition raised £1,160 but I have to confess it was arduous raising the sponsorship and collecting the money. (My poor liver suffered terribly - :lol: )
Good luck
allan

I'd been thinking that seeing as I was going to clock up so many kilometres, it would be great to use my mileage as a fundraiser and I started out with a couple of recipients in mind. Then I considered the hassles of handling two lots of monies and decided to opt only for our local hospice and use their system to handle all the donations. And then I got wondering if sponsors would want to have regular updates on exactly where in the landscape I was and pictures and paragraphs of impressions and speaking engagements when I got back home and I felt myself coming under the weight of expectations. You see, I just want to wander along living each day fully and not have to even take a photo, or a phone call or find a wifi connection or any other constraint or obligation. And although I fully intend to walk the Salvador and the Primitivo and the Fisterra and other detours as I go, maybe slacking off for a few days here or there might be therapeutic for me too.
Has anyone else balanced the primary focus of pilgrimage with a secondary focus of fundraising? Was all well?
And, as David pointed out on another thread, I may be a pilgrim but it is an expensive undertaking. In biblical terms I feel that I am blessed as I am a blessing in my going so wherever I am is just fine. However, my frugal roots find it extraordinarily indulgent to splurge on a journey that is not overtly or primarily for anyone else's direct benefit and I do wonder if other folks feel a twinge of guilt and how you process that?

Mary

I started out doing the Ingles for Charity, got carried away and continued with the Finisterra for me. I enjoyed the freedom from obligation. Last year I walked the Frances in memory of my stillborn grandson Jakob hoping that his credential and compostela would provide some comfort to his parents. I then went to Muxia for me. This year whatever I walk is going to be selfishly for me only.

My primary goal was pilgrimage (selfish, but in a good way). I also felt it was important to pray for and to help others in the process. I raised funds for two charities --- the first being a house that helps young, single mothers who decide to keep their unplanned child, the second being a newly formed hospice that was grounded in Catholic moral teachings around end of life and educated seniors around preparing for their end of life decisions.

My plan for raising money was that my son and I would carry a stone on behalf of each donor --- the bigger the donation, the bigger the stone. We had the stones blessed in Santiago and returned them to the parishioners at a "Pilgrim's Potluck" where we shared pictures and stories. We raised over $12,000 and ended up carrying just shy of 11 lbs of stones total. We also had the donors (as well as those who were unable to donate) write down some intention of theirs, and my son and I prayed daily for their intentions.

At risk of drawing the perennial topic of "suffering" into this, the act of sacrifice (carrying the extra weight was sacrificial for us), and the act of praying daily for the individual needs of over 200 people, may son and I learned a great deal about selflessness. Although we received no financial benefit from the donations, what we did receive was infinitely more valuable.

I would encourage anyone seeking to walk in support of a cause to do so.

TerryB said:

To save any hassle it is easy to set up an account with an on line charity support group e.g. "Justgiving" - http://www.justgiving.com/en/how-justgiving-works

Click to expand...

I wish I had know of services like Justgiving; it would have made money handling much easier.

My decision to walk came before the idea that if I was doing something extraordinary, who not try to raise funds for charity. My sponsors fell into two categories, local friends here in Spain who I see on a regular basis, and more distant friends and family living in the UK. I set up a just giving page in favour of Macmillan Nurses and asked my UK friends to donate there if they so wished. I sent a gentle reminder on completion of my camino. I raised approximately £300 this way. But it seems nothing beats a tin rattler - my partner shook his tin in front of all our friends and local businesses whilst I was away walking and he raised an impressive €1,000 for a local cancer hospice from a population that has its heart strings tugged in all directions for donations to charity. People find it harder to refuse a face to face request than they do to ignore an email. That said, it takes someone with a reasonably thick skin to ask for money - not something I am good at.

I walked the Pennine Way plus the extra to get home last year and raised £2000 for local charity and the British Heart Foundation.

To be fair almost all of it was raised by others, almost all I did was the walk itself but it gave them a an opportunity.

I intend doing the same this year on the Camino Frances.