A Terrific Fundraising Idea for your School’s Photography Department
Posted on | November 16, 2009 | No Comments
Several of the photo departments that I deal with are involved with charitable associations or have class projects that make the students and or department come up with extra money for things like guest speakers or field trips. As we all know too well, this economy is making things tough all over and making it harder for all of us to come up with the money to participate in these special events and putting greater emphasis on fund raising. And while we may be spending less money, it sure seems we are all spending more time communicating through the latest electronic social networking fad- using services such myspace, Faceboook, Linked in, twitter, eHarmony, etc, etc, etc…and if you aren’t trust me your students and co-workers are!
Well, a couple of the schools that I work with have come up with an interesting and successful fund raising solution that seems to make a great deal of sense. Each of the social networking services asks the user to have images of themselves for their profiles. Yet, so many people use really bad and/or old photographs of themselves…just look at my cheesy corporate head shot that I use! So why not invite the students, faculty, staff, and local photo industry representative (maybe even the public) to come on in to your studios and walk a way with several low res images of themselves that they can use to update their profiles. Most people won’t think twice about coming up the nominal fee of something like $10, $15, or $20…especially if they know that it is going towards a good cause such as a charity or educational program.
It is simple to do. Create a poster announcing the event and it cause. Then get your faculty and students to volunteer to man the studios – or even turn it in to an assignment for a portrait class? Set up a 4 or 5 different of portrait stations. It is probably a good idea to have at least one “serious”, “traditional” set-up, but don’t be afraid to make it fun with a bunch of different backgrounds, themes, props, hats, boas, etc. Perhaps your theater department could help you out? You may be able to do it on a first-come first-serve basis. If the response is particularly strong you might actually want to have schedules time slots. Funnel the customers through the various set ups. At the end give them a CD with a couple of images from each set up. You’ll probably want to limit it to no more than 2 or 3 images from each set. Be sure to spell the details of how many images they’ll get, and the resolutions that will be made available. For this kind of money you probably don’ t want the perception to be that you’ll be providing professional portrait sessions that will result in images suitable for large prints that their mothers can hang over the mantle. Plus you may not want to be seen as competing against local portrait photographers and alumni……
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