Finding the funds in fun runs: exploring physical activity events as fundraising tools in the nonprofit sector
✍ Scribed by Joan Wharf Higgins; Lara Lauzon
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 2003
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 230 KB
- Volume
- 8
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 1465-4520
- DOI
- 10.1002/nvsm.226
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
Abstract
An increasingly popular form of raising funds in the nonprofit sector is the special event that involves some form of physical activity. This paper describes a study that tracked 50 events over nine months in order to explore the phenomenon of physical activity events, their function as a solicitation strategy and as a public awareness/relations tool, and to gauge how these events met the needs of participants who donated their money and energy to a cause. Data were collected by means of participant observation at 12 events and interviews with 12 participants and 12 hosting organisations. Using a social marketing framework and diffusion of innovations theory as an approach to making sense of the data, the results suggest that events serve two main purposes: celebrating a cause and offering an event that satisfies the physical activity interests of participants, and that events appropriately act as fundraising and publicity tools. Implications for adopting a social marketing orientation so that nonprofit organisations can hasten the diffusion process by tailoring events to meet the needs of participants, and for further research are discussed. Copyright © 2003 Henry Stewart Publications