How to Organize Donation Camps in Your Company

Submitted by Gaurav Bhattacharya

Are you planning to set up a donation drive in your company? As much as it’s a great cause, and an amazing team activity, it also happens to be a task that needs a lot of planning. You need to understand the nature of the donations, and how they work. Then, there is the marketing side of this drive. Here you will need to do a lot of publicity and bring as many people together as you can.

So we decided to come up with a plan of action that can help you conduct your corporate social responsibilities in a more efficient way, where you can focus more on work, and spend less time thinking about the dreadful organizational aspect of it.

1. Find an Organization and Contact Them

This is the first step that you need to take care of while planning a donation drive in your organization. Depending on the kind of donation you will be making, you need to find the organization(s) that’s the best fit for your service. Find an organization requesting donation needs and contact them. There are many agencies out there that also maintain a directory of such organizations, so it will be a good idea to contact them as well.

Once you have completed your search for an organization, tell them the description of the donation camp you are planning to conduct and the items you plan to donate. In case your donation drive has any sort of time constraints, make a mental note to inform them about the same.

Make sure the organization is a registered 501c(3) nonprofit. If the organization is not registered with the IRS, none of the donations will be tax deductible and you won't know if the organization is reliable and would put your donations to good use.

2. Set Up a Committee

There’s no doubt that donation drives are a fun activity that also helps in building interpersonal skills among the employees and employers. However, you can’t ignore the fact that they also tend to go haywire if not planned properly, things can get hard to manage pretty easily. So instead of trying to be a one-man army, it’s best if you can form a committee consisting of people who are willing to perform the roles assigned to them. You can allot different duties to them and give them their specific designations in the committee.

Here’s a rough idea:

i) A Chairman who can ensure that all the tasks are being performed on time and as per the plan, and also answer any and every question.

ii) Liaison who can communicate with management.

iii) Advertising and Marketing Coordinator.

iv) A dedicated Photographer.

v) A dedicated contact person for any communication to be made outside the company.

vi) Collection Box In-charge.

vii) Donation Collection and Management In-charge.

viii) Donation Packing and Delivery In-charge

3. Set Goals

You need to set a specific amount of donations. Once you have a ballpark figure, you can then get a more precise amount. From there you can ask the advertising and marketing coordinator of your committee to help you achieve the set goal.

4. Make it a Joint Effort

Encourage employees and managers to also participate in the donation drive. For example, if you are conducting a food donation, the managers, or the company itself, can donate a dollar or two for every pound of food donated.

5. Add the Internet to Your Drive

When we have technology to market and promote the donation drive, why not use it to your advantage and propel your drive to more people? One good example would be to engage the family members of the employees, where they can make online donations. For this, you will need to setup an online collection box. A good example would be $20 would mean a box of food to feed three people for a week.

Some other points that you need to keep in mind while organizing a donation camp include factors such as locations where you can set up the donation boxes. The timeline is also important. The employees must not feel pushed to make a donation. Schedule donation time slots so that the work doesn’t get affected, and neither does their break time. The key lies in time management.

Ask your employers to set a specific time slot for the employees to make donations. The thing is: you don’t conduct such drives on a regular basis, so it won’t make much of a difference to you or your company’s productivity. On the contrary, it will be beneficial for all. Let’s make a difference, and put a smile on someone’s face today.

Remember, donation camps are not just great social cause, but also great team building activities. Bring as many people together as you can and see your employees looking forward to many more such events. A happy employee is indeed a productive employee.

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