How To Participate

Who can participate in this project? Anyone!

While many of the people participating in this project are woodworkers, we want everyone to be involved whether you make soap, clothes, furniture, candles, art, or quilts! And no amount raised is too small! Danny Thomas, the founder of St. Jude, said "I'd rather have a million people give me a dollar than one give me a million. That way you've got a million people involved."

When you’re ready to participate in this project, here is how to get going.

Decide how you want to fundraise

There are two questions you need to decide on for your fundraiser:
  • Do you want to raffle your item or sell it?
  • Do you want to do a St. Jude fundraiser or collect money using Venmo, cash, etc.?

Raffle or sell item

A raffle is usually a great way to generate a lot more money for an item than it would normally sell for. It's common for a charcuterie board to generate over $500 in raffles. Since you're doing it for a well-known charity that helps kids with cancer, people are happy to buy tickets. The Wheel of Names website is great to enter all the names and generate a winner.

You can also sell an item and donate the proceeds to the fundraiser.

How to collect and donate money

There are several benefits to creating your own St. Jude fundraiser that is part of the Makers for St. Jude group. All donations that are donated to your personal fundraiser will also show up under the group's fundraising amount. Other benefits of creating your own fundraiser are:
  • People can donate directly to your fundraiser to buy raffle tickets or pay for an item, and they get a tax deduction for doing it.
  • You can email a thank you to each person that donates.
  • It's an easy way to keep track of all your donations.
  • St. Jude has pretty cool gifts as you hit fundraising milestones.
  • You can ask for donations on social media saying that even $10 matters, and it’s amazing how many people will do it!

If you want to create your own fundraiser, visit the Makers for St. Jude fundraising page and click the Fundraise with this Group button.

If you don't want to do your own fundraiser, you can keep track of your donations from Venmo, cash, etc. and select Make a general donation to this fundraiser on the group page.

Promoting your fundraiser

Below is a template you can use as a starting point for your Instagram post or reel. You can do whatever you want for the raffle ticket costs, and if you are not using Venmo remove those sections. A reel is good so we can remix it to post on our feed to help promote your fundraiser.

Sample Template

🎗️ [item] RAFFLE FOR ST. JUDE 🎗️

[Details about your item, why you’re doing it, etc.]

- I am doing this as part of the @makersforstjude Childhood Cancer Challenge
- 100% of the donations will go to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
@stjude @stjude[your local chapter]
- You can donate to enter the raffle 2 ways, directly to St. Jude or Venmo:
1️⃣ Go to my bio and click “St. Jude Raffle” link
2️⃣ Vemno me at [your Venmo] --OR-- Vemno (DM me for info)
- The cost is $10 for one entry OR $25 for 3 entries – there are unlimited entries!
- Leave your IG handle or email in the comment section when using Venmo and in the note section on the fundraising page
- This raffle has no affiliation with IG and is only eligible to participants in the continental United States
- Raffle entries accepted through [end date]
- Winner will be drawn using Wheel of Names on [drawing date]

Please SHARE this so we can get more entries and thank you all for supporting the kids of St. Jude!
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@makersforstjude @stjude #makersforstjude #stjude #childhoodcancerchallenge #childhoodcancerawarenessmonth
Partner Sponsors: @sawdust_talk @surfprepsanding
Prize Sponsors: @georgesupplycompany @_aglimpseinside @carbonmethod @realmilkpaintco @rockler_woodworking @walrusoil @workbenchconference @totalboat @toolstoday @twwguild @isotunes @mullettools
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[custom tags if you wish]

Here are some Instagram examples of makers that have already done a raffle to get ideas:

You can also customize your St. Jude fundraising page to promote your raffle. You can edit your profile pic to the item you are raffling and also edit the story to add details of your raffle. A good example of this is Thousand Mile Designs fundraising page.

IMPORTANT! Make sure to add a link to your St. Jude fundraiser in your Instagram bio.

If you are doing a project for our cause, or have any questions, please contact us, preferably using Instagram messaging. Also, be sure to follow our social media page @MakersForStJude. For every project you do for this cause, we will list on it our makers page.

You are free to use the logo for promotion, CNC or laser work, or anything else associated with the project. If you need a different format, let us know.

The kids of St. Jude thank you for participating and making a difference to cure childhood cancer.

Grit

Our first annual Childhood Cancer Challenge is currently running now through the end of November. We have a lot of great prizes for the makers and adding more, so don't miss out!