Organizing games to raise money for charity can be a great way to involve the local community in a purpose without being preachy or heavy-handed. The thrill involved in games of luck or skill makes them hard to resist. Mystery dinner theater productions, animal races, and game show simulations are popular because they're cost-effective, fun ways to raise money quickly for a good cause.
Mystery Dinner Theater
Mystery dinner theater allows your guests to play detective and solve a mystery. A location with a stage is ideal, as is a facility with a kitchen area. Fundraiserhelp.com suggests that the acts in your performance be divided by the meal courses.
You'll want a paying crowd that's large enough to make back the money spent on food, the actors (if they aren't volunteer) and the room itself. Charge one flat rate that includes the show and all courses of the meal. Keep close track of costs as you plan and prepare. Fundraisinghelp.com suggests doubling the cost for your ticket rate (i.e., if one complete meal costs $12 to prepare, charge $24). For playgoers it's a bargain for dinner and a performance.
Racing Mice?
Courtesy of the website Charitable Auctions comes this unorthodox and amusing concept to raise money: a rodent race.
Set up a track or maze. A rodent or other creature (people have been known to race turtles) is placed on the track or in the maze. At the pop of the toy cap gun, the animal is placed on the starting line and set loose toward the finish line (hopefully). The website also recommends taking into account how many people want to enter an animal in the race and factoring in the cost of the rodents or animals if you're picking them up from a pet store.
Game Show
This is a fantastic and appropriate fundraiser for public schools and university organization, as the emphasis here is not on chance or luck, but intelligence.
Modeling a fundraising game show after a show like "Jeopardy" or "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" is a safe bet. You'll need to make a scoreboard, and you'll need to select a "host" to facilitate the proceedings and ask the questions. Such game-show style fundraisers are very popular with schools. To participate, contestants will pay to enter the tournament (keep the fee at under $5), and will compete with other contestants by answering trivia questions. To keep the fundraiser going, winners can move on to another level, until there are only two participants left. Prizes can be locally donated gift items from businesses or charitable organizations
Tags: dinner theater, Mystery dinner theater, raise money, track maze