Millennium millions?
Howard Lake | 6 July 1998 | News
The Year 2000 might bring technological mayhem to the unprepared, but it is also a once-in-a-lifetime fundraising opportunity. Or is it? UK Fundraising looks at millennium fundraising appeals.
How did fundraisers view the new Millennium? Some saw it as a valuable opportunity to launch an appeal, an appropriate occasion to look forward to a better future in which the charity’s cause might be fulfilled. Others saw it as a bandwagon which was best avoided, since too many other organisations were trying to capitalise on it.
Did your charity use the Millennium to fundraise? Were you using the Internet in some way to do so? UK Fundraising asked for examples of innovative Millennium-related fundraising activities to list here. We did not plan to list every fundraising event or appeal that happened to be taking place in 2000. Instead we hope you would share some innovative ideas with fellow fundraisers.
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In February 1998 ICFM‘s Public Affairs Committee announced a “Millennium Diary” which would set out key fundraising events for charities throughout the UK. You could submit a listing by marking your communication “Millennium Diary”.
Millennium fundraising campaigns
- One of the more practical methods of celebrating the Millennium change was to sign up for the Children’s Promise. Endorsed by the government in 1998, the Promise involved agreeing to donate the value of your salary for the last hour of the last day of 1999. The Promise campaign was widely promoted with full-page colour advertisements in various national newspapers on New Year’s Eve 1998.
- The World Wildlife Fund’s 500 Days to Change the World invited Internet users around the world to take part in its 500 Day Countdown Tour, a four-day, four-city journey across America that aimed to engage the public in conservation for the 21st century. To thank users for their commitment to the environment, the site offered a free WWF screensaver, Living Planet Pledge certificate, electronic postcard, and online message wall.
- House Our Youth 2000 – NCH Action for Children’s goal is to abolish youth homelessness by 2002, “consigning the problem of youth homelessness to the twentieth century.”
- Earth Legacies – the Millennium Foundation of Canada claimed to be the “first organisation in the world dedicated solely to the creation of legacies to mark the year 2000.” It aimed to encourage people to mark the Millennium by leaving charitable bequests in their will to help fund environmental charities.
- The Times newspaper launched its Millennium Appeal to raise funds to rebuild St Ethelburga’s, the City of London medieval church which was nearly destroyed by the IRA bomb in 1993. Launched on 30 June by the Right Rev Richard Chartres, Bishop of London, the appeal will fund the new St Ethelburga Centre for Reconciliation and Peace.
This seemed to be the first national newspaper fundraising appeal with the Millennium tag. (5/7/1999) - Local newspapers also launched newspaper fundraising appeals The Community Foundation of Greater Manchester launched a Millennium appeal in association with the Manchester Evening News. The Helping Hand appeal was launched in late May 1999. The idea was create a million pound legacy for Manchester, with the money raised being placed into an endowment fund. The Duke of Westminster agreed to match any amount raised. (9/7/1999)
- First Cheque 2000 recommended that you “make your first cheque of the new Millennium perform wonders” (9/7/1999)
- ITV’s Year of Promise launched on 17 October 1999 and encouraged viewers to make a promise to make a difference to society in the new Millennium. It could involve fundraising: TV celebrity Carol Vorderman pledged to raise £300,000 for children’s hospital charity Express Link Up. Read UK Fundraising’s report. (17/10/1999)
- British Gas-sponsored Beacon Millennium was a plan to light beacons across the country on the night of 31st December and encourage local charity fundraising as part of the event. It was promoting five charities in particular, the British Paralympic Association, Help the Aged, The Cancer Research Campaign, UNICEF (UK) and WWF- UK, but participants could fundraise for any charity they wished.
- Greenwich Meridian 2000 were offering charities the chance to own “a piece of time” back in 1997. Charities could own one of the “Countdown Days” which were available at £3,500. Purchasers got to hold a Millennium celebration at the Old Royal Observatory. It is not clear if any charities signed up.
Planning ahead
Who first started taking practical steps to plan for a Millennium fundraising appeal? We’re not too sure, but we list plausible claimants.
- Andrew Rainsford of St Asaph Diocesan Stewardship Committee, Wrexham, wrote in March 1997 to ICFM Update about his Millennium idea:
“One of the Council of Management came across an artist who had come up with the idea of a “Millennium Calendar”. Our council member decided to buy a day – and then gave it to the Charity… This … leaves us with an idea for a day in a calendar which is not happening? Does anyone know of a calendar which is happening?”
Avoiding the Millennium appeal
If everyone else was using the Millennium as a convenient fundraising tag, then should you have joined in and competed? Tony Elischer of Burnett Consulting thought not. At the end of 1997 he proposed that fundraisers use the 24-month countdown to the new Millennium “to change the way we currently do things and to eliminate much of the tired run of the mill approaches that still exist in the sector.” He therefore introduced his campaign to “Abolish factory fundraising”. In short, he advocated that we “encourage people to recognise mass production fundraising and to stop it.”
As for Millennium-related fundraising, Elischer said in May 1998 that “if you haven’t already booked your place in the race and designed your car, don’t start now”. At the same time, “if you are not using the Millennium to be offensive, you need a defensive strategy” to cope with the effect of all the other Millennium appeals.
Source: ELISCHER, A. Abolish Factory Fundraising, Professional Fundraising, December 1997, p.16
Source: ELISCHER, A. The Millennium Bug, Professional Fundraising, May 1998, p.38
After the Millennium
The aftermath of the Millennium offered a major fundraising opportunity to some shrewed charities. Two enterprising US charities asked all those who stored food and supplies in anticipation of social breakdown due to the Y2K “bug” to donate them to charity. Second Harvest launched the Y Go 2 Waste campaign, which ran from 15th January to 15th February 2000, and Americares sought donated goods too. (21/1/2000)
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.