GOthat

Over the past year I’ve had my eyes opened up to the world of fundraising. With the School of Arts in the Village where I’m on the committee we have to raise $20,000 every year just to keep the place open for the community to use. It’s a big task asking the same small pool of people in the community for money each year over and over again so you have to keep changing the kind of functions and fundraising events so that people continue to get something from it, whilst they hand over their hard earned cash to us. At Daisy’s school it’s the same – it’s teeny tiny with just 35 kids in attendance so the fundraising is slower than it would normally be. We have one big event during the year the Easter Market where it’s all hands on deck for the day with lots of people attending from out of town and most of the funds for the year are made. The rest of the year it’s slow. One event at a time for one thing at a time – last week Rob helped make some frames for the new veggie patches for the kids but it’s now at a stop, until we can raise money for the chicken wire.

Fundraising is slow. Hard. Work. Plain and simple.

Della and Belinda are two savvy Mum’s who have just set up a new online business bringing people deals on a huge range of products. But with a difference. A difference that helps the groups that I work with in the community. Like any aggregator of online discount offers, GOthat scours the web (from popular websites like Cudo, Spreets, Getaway Lounge, Sure Deal, Living Social and Lime & Tonic which typically offer 50-70% off dining, pampering, products, activities and travel)  for the best daily deals across Australia and delivers them to their subscribers in one consolidated email. BUT. The one thing that sets GOthat apart and what I really think is FAB is that the prices of the deals are exactly the same as what you would get elsewhere BUT they donate 50% of their commission (usually ends up being about 5% of the purchase price)  to the consumer’s charity of choice! How cool is that? 

This is how it works: 

You sign up to Gothat.com and you will receive a daily email with all of the deals that they have on offer. This could be travel or pampering for example and if you purchase something, 50% of the commission that Gothat receives goes straight into your charity of choice. You elect your charity at the time of signing up (there are a range of 16 charities on there already), and you can make changes to the charity each time you buy something if you want to share it around. You can even nominate your own School or non for profit organisation so that it becomes an easy way to raise funds for your own cause closer to home or your heart. Say if you wanted to add your School, you could get all the parents of the School to sign up, then if something took your fancy and was purchased, money that would be spent otherwise is being directed to your chosen charity. It’s so clever don’t you think? 

This video gives a better explanation and has cool graphics a go-go!

Della Pin one of the founders, is a Mother of a severely intellectually disabled young adult and knows only too well the continuous fundraising needed for resources and programs. Together with her mate Belinda who had 20 years experience in leading IT start up’s they created GOthat as the new “internet age” of fundraising. 

I think it’s just smart. 

Like the School’s voucher system created by the supermarkets it’s tapping into what people like me are doing every day (shopping online) and giving the consumer an option for charity and then control in where their fundraising money can go. I would much prefer to choose to buy something from these guys and have some money go somewhere good, rather than just into the aggregator’s commission back pocket. By getting friends or community members on board and your non for profit charity chosen, you could start your own fundraising wave for your own community group – with no effort on your behalf.