Sponsorship Woes/Ideas

[gdc03120]

My 16U rec-ball team does not get any form of assistance/grants, so all of our money for our girls comes from area businesses and their donations. We were able to obtain $1700 last year from 7 businesses, but I'm looking to expand for this year and am looking for ideas for "incentives" to return to businesses this year. To preface, we're a small (~5,000) community, most businesses are mom/pop-type stores with a few chain businesses, etc.

Some of the incentives we offered last year included: Small/large thank you plaques, differing sizes of advertising space on a banner displayed at home games, business logo on team t-shirts, advertising messages/posts on our team's FB page, etc. (however I, unfortunately, was lax on this through the season, so I've considered eliminating it for this year).

What are some other ideas of ways to promote/reciprocate to the businesses that would potentially donate to us? Without these funds (that go for umpires' fees, game balls, insurance, etc), we would have to charge the girls for the chance to play, and that would eliminate this team entirely, I fear.

 

[InsidePitch]

Try offering some marketing incentives. If you have a restaurant/burger/ice cream place you could give out coupons to people at the game. This goes back to my beer league days. We play and then head over to the tavern that sponsors us. Theoretically he got his money back with what we spent over the year in his place.

 

[YOCOACH]

First of all, every year, our old rec league gave each team sponsor a photo-placque with an engraved thank you to hang on thier wall at the business. The team sponsors get their names on the kids caps or visors for the team. Secondly, every year they send out their 12U boys baseball and girls softball teams to canvas door to door and solicit funds. Each team is responsible for a certain neighborhood or section of a larger one. They had 8 teams total of 12-13 players each, walked for about 2 1/2 hours and brought in just under $4000.00. Third, the league has a deal with a local business that makes banners. They solicit advertising banners from area businesses. The initial year, a 3x4 foot banner costs $250.00. $150 to make it and $100 fee. Every year afterwards its $100. The baseline fences and OF fences are completely covrred with these signs and the businesses get to write all of this off as advertising since the league is a NPO.

ETA: Our HS team Booster club sets up numerous fundraisers throughout the year. Their favorite seems to be ticket days. In return for the business donating 10% of the ticket price, the team would advertise that day by word of mouth, handing out flyers to people on the street in front of the store and "papering" where legal. They do this for both restaurants and local apparel stores. They raise quite a bit of money this way. They also send the team to the local bowling alley on league nights and sell a 50/50 drawing a couple of times.

 

[JAD]

Putting sponsors on the back of jerseys has worked for some REC leagues in the past...

 

[gdc03120]

We've done some things similar to what has been mentioned before - uniform advertisements are a no-go since we have custom uniforms printed, and the uniforms are (mostly) paid for by the parents (who wanted as bare minimum as possible). We did a LARGE banner that we specified specific sizes of space for businesses depending on how much they donated. We did plaques for, again, those who donated specific amounts. As well as placing logos on team t-shirts that were available for sale (though none were sold, unfortunately, due to poor marketing). This year, I have a MUCH better grasp of what needs to be done, but we would like to offer better incentives to those who donate - it's difficult, however, in an area like this.

We are considered a not-for-profit, so all donations are advertising expenses - it's hard to convince some businesses to donate based on this fact, I've found. I've thought about the idea of a car wash as we get toward Father's Day or so (since our practices are Wednesday/Sundays) or perhaps other ideas, but we need around $700 to successfully keep our team going.

 

[JAD]

YOCOACH's banner idea is a great way to generate reoccurring revenue year after year.

 

[gdc03120]

YOCOACH's banner idea is a great way to generate reoccurring revenue year after year.

Our youth baseball/softball program does that, and the banners have looked very nice on the fields. This team, however, is ONE team who will have a grand total of about FIVE home games for the entire 1 month season. Not exactly the most profitable from a business point-of-view, if I look at it that way.

 

[JAD]

Your original post made it sound like you were fundraising for a league. How many girls on the team? Try local restaurants, volunteer to go there as a team for a meal before or after a game. You could do a raffle and require each player to sell a certain $ amount. They can either sell their raffle tickets or just write a check and put their name on the tickets.

 

[gdc03120]

Thanks for the heads up. I edited the OP - it is just one team that is a part of a much larger league. Last year we had 11 girls, this year is TBD (I'm anticipating around the same number - I'm losing 7 of my 11 from last year, but have heard interest from at least 5-6 new girls). I can look into the idea of raffles or such. My intention was to sell t-shirts with the logos and names of our sponsors once they were determined - my biggest issue is how to tread carefully around things because we are a "not-for-profit" team/organization. So how do I appropriately fund-raise, generate donations/profit, while ensuring that all money is used at the end of the season?

 

[YOCOACH]

There are all kinds of NPOs and depending upon which type you are, many are allowed to carry a balance from year to year, even if it's a minimal amount. If you're not allowed to carry over a balance, then spend it on equipment and balls for the following year. Just ask us, it's easy to blow a huge amount of money on this stuff. Fundraise the heck out of it!

As far as fundraising goes, I think the quickest way our TB team ever made money was to have our team and their parents sell these

SpiritCups for School & Sports Team Fundraisers | BRAX Fundraising

If I remember correctly, for every $18 sale, the team gets $12 of it. Our team made over $700 in 3 weeks of sales though this was around Christmas time and many orders were Christmas presents.