However, nonprofits can use the summer slowdown to their advantage by:
How to boost your fundraising momentum during the summer slowdown
Beat the summer slump with these 8 engaging fundraising ideas!
As summer approaches, contributions often decline as supporters take vacations, spend more time on leisure activities, and their routines shift.
- Planning for the Giving Season
- Improving donor relationships
- Enhancing donation experience
- Preparing for back to school campaigns
Important! The main objective for your organization during the summer isn’t to raise a lot of money, but to build community and engage supporters—so they’re warmed up and ready to give during the fall and winter Giving Season.
Here are 8 fun and engaging fundraising ideas to beat the summer slump:
Car Wash
Gather student volunteers to wash cars in exchange for contributions. Offer additional services like vacuuming, dusting, and interior window cleaning as perks to encourage more donations and streamline the process.
Walk/run
Map out a simple 5k walk or run route and rally supporters to participate. Use peer-to-peer fundraising to create custom registration forms, assign team captains and members, and showcase your leaderboard to spark some friendly competition!
Movie night
Host a ticketed indoor or outdoor movie night and sell popcorn, snacks, and drinks. Boost ticket and concession sales by offering them as rewards to encourage participation and make the event run smoothly.
BBQ challenge
Host a fun and flavorful challenge like the Ring of Fire P2P event and let supporters vote on who will win the spicy chicken wing competition. Let participants create their own campaign pages to foster creativity and personalization.
Beach/park clean-up
Make the most of long summer days by organizing a beach or park clean-up to help keep the environment clean. Use our pre-set campaign templates to create a beautiful, themed fundraising page that inspires giving.
Summer fruit basket
Partner with local farmers to curate and sell seasonal summer fruit baskets. Offer them through a custom donation form to make giving easy and seamless for supporters.
Ice cream party
Host a summer ice cream party with fun toppings and flavors. Encourage extra donations to unlock special add-ons like gold foil, and boost contributions by embedding your donation widget on your website.
Youth volunteering
Offer donors the chance to “purchase” student volunteer hours for tasks like lawn mowing or dog sitting. Simplify giving with a donation form featuring preset amounts (e.g. $50 = 2 hours of help).
