The charity sweepstake, done right.
A charity sweepstake is the easiest fundraiser a workplace can run: the tennis does the entertaining, the hat does the admin, and the awkwardness of taking colleagues' money evaporates the moment the pot is going somewhere good. Here's how to structure one so it raises a decent amount and stays fun.
Why charity sweeps work better
A money sweep has a quiet friction: someone wins £40 off their teammates, and someone else grumbles. Point the pot at a charity and the friction disappears - people happily pay more per ticket, managers can join without it being weird, and the person who wins gets something better than cash: glory, and the right to choose where the money goes (more on that below). In practice a charity sweep at £5 a ticket raises more than a £2 personal sweep ever collects.
Pick the structure before you collect a penny
- Everything to charity, glory prize for the winner. The simplest and most common: 100% of the pot donated, and whoever draws the champion gets bragging rights plus something token - the tin of biscuits, the trophy mug, first pick of desks. Works best when the charity is one the group chose together.
- The 50/50. Half to charity, half to the winning ticket. A good middle ground for groups who want real stakes - the winner usually donates their half anyway, but making that voluntary is the point.
- Winner picks the cause. The whole pot is donated to a charity chosen by the winning ticket-holder. This one produces the best engagement, because every ticket suddenly represents a cause as well as a player.
- Employer match.Before you draw, ask whether your company match-funds staff fundraising - many do, and a matched pot doubles the result for one email's effort.
Amounts and admin
£2 to £5 a ticket is the sweet spot for a charity sweep - high enough to raise something meaningful, low enough that everyone joins. Collect before the draw, announce the total in the invite thread ("28 tickets sold, £140 in the pot for [charity]"), and when it's done, donate through a proper platform like JustGiving and post the receipt in the same thread. That receipt is what turns a fun fortnight into something people trust and rejoin next year. If donors are UK taxpayers and give directly through such a platform, Gift Aid can add 25% at no cost - worth mentioning in your invite for anyone who tops up individually.
Running the fortnight
The mechanics are the same as any sweep - and the fairness matters even more when the money is charitable. Draw in the open with the SlamSweep generator (the result is locked into the share link, so the record is beyond dispute), give extra entries to anyone who wants to donate more - the + button handles multiple tickets per person - and keep the updates flowing as players fall. Close with ceremony: announce the winner, make the donation, post the receipt, thank the room. See how to run an office sweepstakefor the full organiser's craft, and rules and variations if you want a points-per-round leaderboard to keep every ticket alive to the final weekend.