I am so sorry but I know I am not posting in the right place. I am in charge of a silent auction to raise funds for education at a local school district. I am trying to get donations from airlines and hotels but not even sure where to begin.

Can anyone give suggestions along with contact info?

I'm sure a moderator will move this to a more appropriate forum, but some ideas for you:

Contact the general manager of some of the hotels in your area, or a nearby city.

Contact travel agents in the area to see if they work with tour groups and could provide you with a trip.

Not sure how to go about getting an airline to donate something ... you can start with local business offices, I guess and go from there.

G'Luck.

This is a fine place for us to try and assist you and BTW, welcome to FlyerTalk.

I actually think that GoingAway gave you some nice direction. For what you are looking for, it is best to assume that the main offices of these airlines and hotel companies are just not prepared for this type of donation process � because it is simply too popular a request.

As noted, the best approach is to contact, usually in person, the general manager of some of your leading local hotels. Often owned by franchisees, they can make a decision that requires no forward paperwork. Now, that's the hotel side of things. As for airlines, a little trickier. My general advice here is that sometimes, though not common, you can contact the "city manager" of a particular airline in your area and they can direct some information on their local policies for contributions to these types of things. The most successful things I've seen is when organizers like yourself, tap into the vast number of "friends of flyers" that know of frequent flyers who you can appeal to for a donation of an "award" to a destination or open destination. Oftentimes, it is best to try and match the free ticket/mileage award, with another donation and try to auction off the package for your fundraising. For instance, maybe the local general manager of a hotel in your area can give away two weekend nights at another property that the franchise owns. Pair that up with the free ticket and you've got an attractive offer for people to bid on. Now, airlines do have rules that prohibit "bartering" and thus it may seem like this is against those policies. But, airlines are fully aware that in situations like this the frequent flyer is simply donating to a cause and that nothing really is being bartered. If you choose this path, make sure that it is understood that frequent flyer miles are part of the package and that the winner must be flexible for the dates of travel they might consider - trust me, in the fundraisers I've been a part of that "joke" will get plenty of laughs but will not deter people from bidding on it.

Whatever your course, it is important that you plan in advance of your pitch, the specific benefits the donor can get from this. Charity is nice, but making sure you are giving prominent exposure to the hotel company, the person donating and even the frequent flyer is a real show of class. Think in advance what you can do to promote their participation. As well, think of other fun things besides free room nights. The hotel might have a nice restaurant, a party room for someone's birthday or other event for up to 15 people with choice of appetizers, etc.

As for airlines, maybe not a free ticket, but honestly, try asking for a packet of free airport lounge certificates (I'd bid on that).

Hope all this helps and in the spirit of FlyerTalk, would invite others to offer up their advice as well.

Again, welcome to FlyerTalk and always feel comfortable asking us questions.

Randy

Go on then, having done a fair bit of scavenging in similar situations myself, I will.

- Deal with individuals, not departments. This means using the phone and then following up with e-mails as needed. Be professional - get to the point, don't waffle.

- It sounds obvious, but so many people forget this one. Make sure the individual you ask, the person you actually speak to, has the authority to say yes. The best option is to speak to someone who has the authority but isn't in a job where they will get asked that often. The hotel's general manager will get loads of requests - the food and beverage manager rather less. Go for the F&B manager. Once you've got the right person there is actually, assuming they've not been badgered to death previously, a very high probability they will offer something.

- Do not, under any circumstances, get into a situation where someone will 'refer it to the right person/department and get back to you'. The polite translation is 'no' - the realistic one is '<insert appropriate expletive here> off'.

- Suggest actual donations. Given the right option the manager can easily just say yes. You're creating work for them if they have to start thinking about what donations they can actually make. They have enough to do already - do the 'creative thinking' yourself.

- Suggest realistic donations. The best ones are those that don't cause vast amounts of work and have no real direct cost. Getting an airline to donate a free flight is going to involve the local manager and his staff in all sorts of paperwork, and will have to be set against some budget or other. Those lounge vouchers Randy suggested - it's probably just a case of grabbing them from the drawer and sticking them in an envelope. There are people within an airline who can, within the stroke of a key, set an account to premium status. Equally the hotel's F&B manager can rattle off a letter in 30 seconds for a free meal, pizzas for 15, etc - and note the use of letter rather than voucher with its promotional code and back endaccounting. If we're talking about an actual physical product then someone within a company will probably be sat in office surrounded by said product just waiting for addresses to send them to on a gratis basis as part of marketing/customer relations - that's the person to speak to, and the budgeting issues have already been sorted.

- approach companies that can leverage your requests. The airline might not offer a free flight to you, but if you approach a travel agency that places loads of business with an airline they can offer F return on the airline's tab but with the agency's name attached at the auction.

- send a thank you letter. When you've run the auction and got the money it's easy to forget where the thing came from. A letter of thanks detailing how much the auction raised (the grand total rather than for the specific item) is the feedback companies really want - a scan of the letter into the annual report is to be had!