For communities that appreciate handmade items, DIY fundraising ideas can be a successful tactic. Having a craft sale or raffling or auctioning off homemade items can be a great way to engage your community and offer them fun, useful, beautiful items for prices that will raise your bottom line.
DIY fundraiser ideas can be anything from crafts for kids to grown-ups advanced handicrafts. Decide what your audience might like. If you’re raising money for a classroom or school, maybe parents will want to bid on their child’s painting or craft. Likewise, if you’re raising funds for a church or veteran’s organization, you might consider selling Christmas ornaments or handknit hats and scarves.
Step-by-Step Instructions for Homemade Fundraisers
Before we jump into the DIY fundraising ideas, we have some advice on how you can run a handmade item fundraiser on a low budget. We understand that organizing any fundraiser can be a challenge: here is a step-by-step guide to holding a successful homemade fundraiser.
1. Gather Your Items
If you have decided to sell handmade items for your fundraiser, the first thing to consider is where you are going to get these items.
You and your group can make everything on your own if you have the time to do so. Alternatively, you can promote your fundraising idea to the community, getting local artisans, craftspeople, and residents involved with your event.
2. Gather Your Makers
Make sure you have plenty of members or volunteers available to help run the event so your operation can go smoothly.
By getting others involved, you can save a ton of time and money and can create an event that is much more exciting and marketable. It also helps draw in more people, since participating artists will want to market their goods.
3. Determine the Event Details
You will also have to decide if you will do an in-person event or place your event online with our online auction software, or both!
Allow people to sell their wares at your fundraising event in exchange for a small participation or booth fee or a percentage of their sales.
4. Find the Event Venue
If your occasion is one that only requires a small amount of space, you can rent a booth, or a pop-up shop, at a local shopping mall or other local spot where you can sell items regularly. You could also hold a yard sale or neighborhood yard sale one weekend featuring your crafts and homemade items.
Something to consider that will attract an even larger audience is to have the artists or crafters make items during the event or even offer “how-to” classes.
If you plan to develop a larger public event, you will need an area that will accommodate your plans. If several crafters are attending to sell their hand-crafted fundraising items, you can talk to the city about using a community park to hold your event. Another option is to see if a local farm, hall, or theater would donate or rent some space for the day.
Look around your community. There may be clubhouses, or other rental spaces available that perfectly match your needs.
5. Promote the Event
Once you have determined how you want to run your homemade item fundraiser, it is time to market it to the public.
Announce that local artists are welcome to participate. Give them plenty of information, so they know how much it will cost for them to rent a booth and whether they need to bring their tables, chairs, canopies, or other supplies.
Be as specific as possible. Provide participants with plenty of contact information so they can pay for their space or ask questions before the fundraising event.
DIY Fundraiser Ideas
Homemade fundraisers can be intimidating. Sure, you have some great sewists in your quilting club, but you also have that one whose colors are eye-smarting, or whose stitching isn’t quite up to your standards. We recommend going with the easiest items for your crafters, so that people of different skill levels can participate.
If you’re only soliciting items from semi-professional crafters, give them some operating parameters. Stick to a few formats, sizes, or price points, so that everyone’s items will appeal to the broadest group of buyers or bidders. We’ve tried to include a variety of ideas
1. Fiber Arts
Knitting, crochet, embroidery, cross stitch and other crafts have seen a resurgence in popularity in the last few decades. This means you could have incredible crafters in your backyard. Ask the local yarn shops, guilds, and clubs if they are willing to donate their time and talents to your fundraiser
Many fiber artists have side hustles or even full time jobs in their chosen craft. Reach out to local businesses to ask if they would be willing to take part in a craft fair or, if they’re schedule won’t allow it, offer pieces to raffle off at your event.
If you’re trying to learn how to make items yourself, the internet is a powerful tool in learning to knit, weave, spin, and more. Get your friends or students involved in creating items to sell.
2. Food Items and Sauces
Items such as hot sauces, honey, fresh or dehydrated produce, spices, baked goods, peanut brittle, fudges, and so on can be sold. Sellers can add their private label to their treats, giving them an opportunity to promote their delicious creations during your fundraiser.
If you’re just starting out in selling foodstuffs, start with simple items like homemade jams and jellies, dried pasta, or baked goods like sourdough loaves or brownies.
3. Handcrafted Dolls and Toys
Dolls, stuffed animals, dollhouses, and unique toys are excellent sellers that make great gifts that parents can purchase for their children. Stuffed animals, or plushies, might be the easiest to make depending on your crafters’ sewing, crochet, or knitting skills, but there are other options too.
Kids still like slime: make jars of custom theme slime, with sprinkles in specific shapes and colors. Paint blank nesting dolls or other blank wooden toys or build dollhouses out of cardboard.
Don’t forget the pets! Making DIY dog and cat toys might be easier than you think, and will likely sell well.
4. Handcrafted Jewelry
Whether pieces are made of sterling silver, beads, or stones, handmade jewelry is always a hit. Plus, you can typically find a skilled artisan in the area who is willing to participate. Get on the trend for beaded bracelets and create colorful combinations. Don’t forget to make different sizes. The great thing about stringing beads on elastic thread is that it takes virtually no skill.
5. Leather Goods
Leather wallets, pouches, purses, slippers, belts, and the like can be sold with the artist’s name embossed in the leather. Coasters, key fobs, cord wranglers, card holders, and more can be embossed with custom messages or with your organization’s name or logo.
Earrings and bracelets are good homemade fundraiser ideas, too: leather makes lightweight jewelry that you can decorate in many ways. Check to see if there are local leatherworking artists who might join in your craft sale or offer classes and demonstrations during it.
6. Soy or Beeswax Candles
These candles sell well and burn beautifully. Scents and colors can be added to molded or jar candles to make them even more appealing. You can go all-natural ingredients if you think those will appeal to your potential customers. Homemade candles can be decorated with dried flowers, incorporate herbs, or be dyed in interesting colors and designs.
Even better, if you’re pouring your candles in glass jars, they can be labeled with your cause or beautiful designs. If you’re making pillar or taper candles, you can also sell candle holders to put them in.
7. Woodcrafts
Hand-crafted decorative wood boxes, shelves, rocking horses, door stops, birdhouses, or other wood items are excellent sellers that many people enjoy. Depending on your wood crafting experience, you might be able to create trays, signs, wine bottle holders, or even cutting boards.
Even if the wood working part is not your forte, you or your fellow crafters can focus on finishing or painting your wood crafts. One plus to this DIY fundraising idea is that you can often repurpose old wood from pallets or old furniture.
8. Wreaths
Straw, grapevine, or Juniper wreaths adorned with dried flowers, ribbons, bows, and other décor make a nice, natural gift that people can enjoy on holidays, for seasonal decorations, or every day. You can use faux flowers or real dried flowers to make your wreaths, and there are a variety of wreath bases, from foam circles to more minimalistic wire bases. You could even offer custom wreaths if you create a simple order form where people can put their preferences for theme (different holidays), colors, and size.
This is a great homemade fundraiser idea because you and your group of crafters can get together with all your supplies and make your wreaths together. If anyone wants to keep their wreath, they can buy it themselves rather than selling it.
In Conclusion
No matter which DIY fundraising ideas you decide to make and sell, make sure that you and your group have thoroughly examined every aspect of your event from planning to implementation. You don’t want to end up with a huge store of handicrafts and no easy way to sell them.
