Volunteers are more than likely critical to your project’s functionality. Respecting volunteers and knowing each of their strengths and weaknesses saves time and frustration. Know your needs. Make sure you know how many volunteers are needed, what will be expected of them, and how long…
Create a PowerPoint presentation: Presenting your project to organizations using visuals aids is engaging, professional, and enjoyable for both the presenter and their audience. Utilize social media, blogs, social networking sites: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and even Craigslist are great resources. This Bootstrapping Your Social Media Engagement slideshow gives some great ideas on how to increase…
Second Harvest distributes more than 2 million pounds of donated food each month to help people in need in its service region – the Inland Northwest. Partnerships with more than 250 neighborhood food banks and meal centers make it possible for Second Harvest to feed 50,000 people each…
Second Harvest’s Food Sourcing/Development Team meets frequently to discuss and measure strategies in building relationships with its donors. A creative, soft approach (friendly; not overbearing) has proven advantageous in their line of success. Being sensitive to donors’ time and schedule are critical for the sustainability…
Outreach & Recruitment Tabling at volunteer fairs, plant sales and harvest fairs, food- and urban agriculture-related events, and events held by organizations with similar missions Emailing city or neighborhood listservs about specific volunteer opportunities Neighborhood outreach including door-to-door flyering Providing service learning and internship opportunities…
Lettuce Link is one of over 30 programs of Solid Ground, a large social service agency that serves Seattle and King County. In keeping with Solid Ground’s mission of “building community to end poverty,” Lettuce Link seeks to create equal access to nourishing, healthy, and culturally appropriate…
Community Fruit Tree Harvest (CFTH) The best way of recruiting donors and volunteers for Lettuce Link is word of mouth. CFTH produces quartersheet flyers that people can easily give to neighbors and friends who are interested in participating in the project. In addition, the season kick-off…
Outreach One of the goals of the Seattle Community Farm is to engage the community in growing and sharing food. Therefore, we only do outreach in the immediate neighborhood around the farm, rather than engaging with large groups from anywhere in the city. The immediate…
Here are some ways that we have found work well to inform the community about what we do: Create a flyer template with a logo or design that stays consistent. People will begin to recognize the layout of the flyer before they even read the…
Similar Goals and Programming If there are organizations doing something similar, why bother competing? Collaboration can allow you to support one another, exchange ideas, and possibly co-sponsor events or classes. This reduces the chances of volunteer recruitment becoming a competition. You may even find it…