A Terrific Valentine’s Day Fundraiser

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Many of you have told me you’re looking for fundraising ideas to help pay for special activities for your residents. Yet, it isn’t easy to do many of your traditional fundraisers while social distancing.

That’s why I’m reposting this popular article I shared a couple of years ago. I especially enjoy this fundraiser because not only does it raise money, but it also adds fun to Valentine’s Day for residents and staff. Families also appreciate this event because it allows them to do something special for their loved one when they can’t be there in person.

Here’s how to plan a Valentine’s Day rose sale:

• Send notices to your resident’s family members about 3 weeks in advance, letting them know about your fundraiser. Set a date by which they need to place and pre-pay for their rose orders. Include an opportunity to write a brief message to go with the gift. Also, be sure to describe the special project the money is going toward.
• To prepare the roses for the sale at our nursing home, we simply take a bud vase, add two beautiful roses and a spray of baby’s breath, then finish it with a pretty ribbon. We deliver the arrangements to residents on the morning of Valentine’s Day.
• I hesitate to tell you how much to charge for the roses because prices vary greatly around the country. You’ll need to charge enough to make it worth your time, but not so much that nobody wants to buy them.
• Be sure you get high-quality flowers. It’s not worth getting them at a cheap price if the flowers wither in a couple of days. Check out reviews on floral shops, grocery stores, and big-box stores.
• Always order a few more roses than you need. This allows for breakage or other problems. If you end up with leftover roses, you can always sell them on Valentine’s Day.
• If you plan your sale a few months in advance, you can get your vases at no cost by asking businesses to save them for you. We’ve had good luck getting bud vases from churches and funeral homes. We also save any vases our residents no longer want. If you’re short on time, thrift stores are a great place to buy vases at a minimum cost. You can also send out a plea on social media asking for donations. We always run the vases through a dishwasher before using them for the sale.
• Find someone with pretty handwriting to write a personal message on a card to go with each gift of roses.
• We find it works best to put the flower arrangements together on the afternoon of the 13th, then leave them in the cooler overnight. This allows extra time to correct any problems you may encounter.
• You can also make up several small arrangements of roses to sell at the front desk on Valentine’s Day. If you’re allowed to have visitors, they’ll often purchase one on their way to see a resident. Staff also buy arrangements on their way out to bring home to a special someone.

I can’t end this post without telling you a brief story about one of the rose sales we held several years ago at our nursing home.  It was shortly after a new nurse joined our management team. Recently divorced, she and her son moved to our city from a small town in northern Minnesota.

I knew the transition was difficult for them. So I decided this was an excellent opportunity to do a little random act of kindness. After buying a vase of roses for her, I simply added an anonymous note letting her know how happy we were to have her on our team.

A short time later, I met her in the hallway. She excitedly told me about the roses she found on her desk. Of course, she had no idea I was the one who left them there.

The nurse told me that back in her hometown, it was a tradition for her sister-in-law to bring her a rose every year on Valentine’s Day. She was thinking about this earlier in the day and feeling sad because she knew there would be no rose this year. Then the vase of roses appeared on her desk.

This was a wonderful reminder of the power of a random act of kindness. We never know when we can bless someone exactly when they need it the most.