Subject: Fundraising advice please

Hi,

I'm going to open an art academy in London. I am thinking about applying for funding from the Big Lottery Fund and putting that money towards fundraising to turn it into more. Is this allowed?

Secondly, can anyone recomend a professional fundraising company to manage the campaign and everything else that will be involved with the fundraising?

Thanks in advance.

Tayler Hughes

Hello Tyler

In answer to your question about whether the Big Lottery Fund will consider making you a grant to pay for fundraising costs, I’m afraid the simple answer is ‘no’.

They will pay towards an appropriate proportion of fundraising costs as part of their contribution to organisational overheads as part of the overall project budget, but the clear and primary focus of your application must be on the project/services that you want to deliver.

Therefore, rather than asking them to pay for a fundraiser, I would suggest that you develop your application around what you actually want to do.  Clearly the programme you apply to will depend on the type of work you want to do, the beneficiary group you will be working with, the potential outcomes, and the size of grant you need.

As part of your development of the application, and indeed as part of your overall planning process, it will be important to consider on-going funding requirements beyond the end of the grant.  Time spent on fundraising, marketing and development activities to support the project’s future sustainability will at least be considered as eligible expenditure within the overall project budget.  Again however, the focus (and greatest proportion of the budget) will need to be on the project activities themselves, and its positive impact on the lives of your beneficiaries.

Hope this helps.