Thanks. I'm pretty proud! I think prior to this year we raised $60K for 3 charities (charities vary each year) during the last 5 years, so we have a good track record.
That's a lot of me running around yelling ge-e-e-e-t your charity raffle tickets!!
And the funds have increased since we started accepting credit cards for the raffle tickets.
Something about travel folk needing to hit their spend for new credit cards or just wanting miles etc.
Also kudos to the hotels, airlines, attendees, sponsors for donating prizes & to the attendees. We also started 2 years ago that you don't have to be present to win, which makes more work for me in terms of shipping prizes or coordinating stuff between donors & winners, but it's worth it due to funds raised.
And great kudos to
Howie, for donating any funds left over after the bills are paid to the charities.
This is literally a volunteer run event, & at the end of it there is a zero balance. No funds go to Howie, me (SkiAdcock), or others. In fact Howie donates the IHG meeting planner points (approximately 145K) each year as the grand prize for the charity raffle.
This is a once/year event run by volunteers. It's not at the most spiffy hotel in a really cool area, but rates are fair & the hotel does an excellent job/ are great.
PS - one of these days I'm actually going to sit in on a session. Normally I'm so busy w/ selling the raffle tickets that I don't have time. The only session I'm involved w/ is Sunday after the drawing when they do the hotel sessions, and I moderate the Marriott session.
Cheers.