Hope you and yours are well. I am hoping you can lead me to the right person.
My name is Jill Serin and I would like to present the idea of a fundraising art auction (maybe along with a wine tasting) to your Lions Club family as a possible event for early 2018 .
The art auction is EASY, ELEGANT, FUN TO PLAN AND ATTEND.
A good part of your responsibility will be PLACE AND PEOPLE. It has a short time line and is a perfect way to attract your surrounding community.
We don't charge a thing to come and work with our groups.
We bring art for every taste and budget including a collection of sports and music memorabilia, all beautifully matted and framed, hand-picked for your audience.
There will be an affordable collection as well as an important Collectors Corner for those who have been buying art for years and years.
We print all your color invites and tickets ( free of charge) AND supply an auctioneer who will educate and entertain all evening long.
I am a hand holder and will walk you through from start to finish. When my name is on an event, I make sure it's a success!
We even offer an opportunity to showcase your own local student artists!
HOW THE EVENING GOES
Everyone arrives and for the first hour, will eat, drink, socialize and preview the collection we have set up around the perimeter of the room.
Chairs are set up theater style. After the hour is up, the auctioneer will spend 10 minutes educating the audience, letting them know what they can expect and then get right into a "live" auction - with everyone on the edge of their seat waiting for their choice to come up on the easel.
SOME IDEAS OTHERS HAVE DONE THAT YOU MAY LIKE
SCHEDULE A WINE TASTING Contact a local vintner/winery to see if they might donate a few cases of various wines in return for the opportunity to sell their wares at the event. A wine tasting can be simple - just 5 or 6 different wines and most vintners have a prepared program.
INVOLVE YOUR STUDENT ARTISTS Collect artwork created by your own student artists (we suggest collective class projects) /artists (some animal shelters involved pets in creating artwork!), we will frame (free of charge), as many as 8 items to be auctioned with all proceeds retained by your organization.
HOST A TASTE OF THE AREA, soliciting local restaurants for a specialty dish (offer to provide them with a full page ad within our catalog) to promote their restaurant.
INVITE YOUR OWN TALENTED who play string instruments and a pianist to play chamber music throughout your preview. (invite parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles)
I have worked with churches, schools, synagogues, Rotary, Junior league, Exchange Club, Chamber of Commerce, Knights of Columbus, Kiwanis, Lions - even the military - whose officers spouses clubs love the event.
They have been done in church social halls, hotels, community centers, hospital lobbies, large realty offices, the conference room of a law office when working with our CASA groups, public libraries, country clubs, city clubs, theaters, the atrium of an office building, even someone's 10,000 Sq. Ft. home!
Read on for a summary of the ways you earn money
I never want my chair people to have unrealistic goals.
You will never put a new wing on the building when you do an art auction, but if you take advantage of every component we offer, you can walk away with a respectable amount of money for the time and energy you put into it.
We print - free of charge, all printed material; tickets and/or color invitations as well as the catalogs for your event .
1. Admission is all yours.
I have groups that take my advice and charge a good amount of money at the door. It's all your money, I am not interested in the monetary value. For me it represents a body at the door the evening of the event.
I encourage an admission price of at least $10 per person. Doing so will encourage attendance, not just a ticket sold and you never see them in your audience!
I also encourage setting an "in advance" price and raising it substantially "at the door." Make it worth their while to pre-purchase their tickets!
** TIP TO INCREASE MONEY EARNED: Offer PATRON/SPONSOR OF THE ARTS OPPORTUNITIES.
PICASSO LEVEL, RENOIR LEVEL ETC. Charge a bit more for those who want to take advantage of this and we will print their names on all printed material and in the catalog we provide for every bidder number.
2. We donate art work
We donate 2 works of art for raffles. All monies stay with you. Offer an EARLY BIRD INCENTIVE. If tickets are purchased before the cut off date, toss in 5 FREE raffle tickets for one of the donated works of art.
Not only will they attend the event for the discounted price, they'll have an opportunity to win a beautifully matted and framed piece of art!
** TIP TO INCREASE MONEY EARNED: Secure a work of art from a "famous" local artist and sell raffle tickets for that as well.
3. Ad Book
We will reproduce and include any ads you collect in our catalog the evening of the event . We do not charge a thing for paper or ink and you get to keep all the money! I have a group that spends 3 months and 20 committee members selling ads - but earns close to $17,000 from their ad book alone!
Already collect ads for another event? Take them anyway and don't charge. But... still leave 6 complimentary tickets to come to the event. We will not charge you for paper or ink and you will create a ton of good will in your community!
** TIP TO INCREASE MONEY EARNED: Offer 6 complimentary tickets to the event for every ad purchased.You will put unfamiliar faces in the room - always good when you're fundraising!
4.Sliding scale percentage
A sliding scale percentage of whatever art is sold at the auction, beginning with 20%, 25% ,30% and 35% of the gross sales - in increments of $ 7,000
5. Donated items
Our auctioneer will be glad to auction "live" up to 10 items (must have a value of $300 or more) you collect, vacations, dinner certificates, golf packages, etc.
All the money earned stays with you. You can display as many silent auction items as you want.
** TIP TO INCREASE MONEY EARNED: Contact a local art school and obtain free art lessons, keeping with the "art" theme of the event.
This usually fetches a pretty penny. Everyone has a "secret artist" inside of them.
6. Art With A Heart
Contact your local art teachers and ask them to do up to 10 class projects. Any medium - (finger paint, oil, watercolor,acrylic, etc)
Ship them to us in a tube and we'll custom matt and frame them, bring them back with us and make them part of the auction that night.
The goal is to have 16- 25 sets of parents all standing on chairs, all bidding for that same family heirloom!
Any money realized from student art goes back to you.
** TIP TO INCREASE MONEY EARNED: Secure some unpainted wood furniture, rocking chairs, toy chests, coffee tables, etc. and have those same students decorate them as a premier piece and we'll auction those off as well.
A lot of energy and passion goes into your art auction before we set foot in your community. Art is bought specifically for your audience and the same collection does not fly everywhere. We can include Rolling Stones , Paul McCartney and Eagles signed guitars, signed Phil Mickelson and Jack Nicklaus golf memorabilia as well as other important names from the sports world.
Attendance is key, the more people attending, the more art is sold, the more money earned.
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QUESTIONS I KNOW WILL COME UP
What is the typical total time frame for the auction event?
Figure a total of 3 hours for the actual event plus an hour for set up and breakdown.
What volunteers do we have to provide?
We will need 6 people to help with set up (it takes an hour) and break down ( less than an hour, hopefully we will be putting less back on the truck than what we took off!)
2 people to sit at the registration table, 3 cashiers to take the money from art sales and 3 runners who will work with our display manager during the "live" auction part of the evening - bringing sold art to the sold area and replacing it with the next auction piece up for bid.
What is the price of the art in the collection?
The average piece of art that sells is somewhere between $185 - $225.
We always include a small higher priced collection (between 10 -15 pieces) for Collectors.
You will have people coming in and buying nothing - and you may have a person who has been buying art for years and years .
There will be something for everyone.
What do we need to have on site to set up for the auction.
You will need 20-25 long 6 (or 8) foot tables set up around the perimeter of the room, 125 chairs set up theater style, ample lighting and good parking.
Let me know if you feel there might be some interest.
Jill Serin, Auction Coordinator
Azalea Fundraising Auctions
Direct 631.889.4635
