Holiday Charity Donations

[Americano]

One of my volunteer functions is seeking publicity for the soup kitchen we volunteer at (which always results in increased donations).

I was making a request for coverage of an upcoming event to the editor of our local newspaper and he told me that this year not only is every charity in the county bombarding them with similar requests, they're getting press releases seeking publicity for charity events from all over the state.

I know his staff has, due to difficult economic times decreasing advertising revenue and circulation, been cut to the bone and I offered to email him photos and a blurb before their press time. He said they're just now putting together their holiday reporting schedule and he'd get back to me.

My next pursuit is TV coverage and I'm probably looking at the same austere financial conditions there. I don't have high hopes of any coverage from that media this year.

Does anyone else do volunteer work and if so are they running into the same obstacles?

[Michael]

As a printing company, we have one rule about doing charity work: there can be no mention of our involvement in any way.

If we put our names down as donating the printing of some charity product, we will be swamped by literally thousands of requests for the same.

Even with our low profile I get a half-dozen requests to do printing for charities every single week. The game never ends. Each charity acts like they've got the cure for cancer and my refusal to print their brochure is the end of the world. Quite pathetic appeals they make.

We've noticed no increase at all of these requests - they are as consistent and persistent (and annoying) as ever. I end up getting rather rude to most of them after they just keep calling and pleading. Most are quite corteous and polite - until we say "no thanks" then they turn on the hard-sell. :shrug: