It’s always group gift season at Cheddar Up: Coaches gifts, teacher gifts, scout leader gifts, even wedding and baby shower group gifts — we see them all. If you’re looking for a simple, automated (and free!) way for collecting money for a group gift, you’ve come to the right place. (In fact, here’s the 5-minute how-to.)
Take a look at these examples to see the variety of ways Cheddar Up users have collected for their coaches, scout leaders, and friends.
1. Include coaches’ gifts in one season activity fee
Since we love efficiency, we love how this volleyball team’s parent leaders included coaches’ gift money in one overall season activity fee — that means they don’t have to collect separately later. We also think it’s a great idea to emphasize that gifting is voluntary and to provide a suggested donation, both of which they did. They also used our goal feature, which reveals how much they have left to meet their minimum needs. Basically, we love all the transparency here — and gifters typically like to know what they’re giving to, too.
2. Designate gift money to a specific coach or teacher
For programs with multiple coaches, or school parent organizations looking to gift the entire staff, you can create a collection that allows parents to select which people to donate to, just like this cheerleading squad and elementary school did. Why is it smart? One: You only have to create one collection, and two: you only have to check one collection’s reporting center, which will automatically break down how much you’ve received for each person.
3. Divide one gift card fund evenly among entire staff
While this is as simple as creating a collection with only one open amount item, we really like the way this school offered a number of gifting levels. It gives direction while accommodating multiple financial circumstances, yes, but it also ensures that the group will receive gifts in $5 increments, which is typically required for purchasing most gift cards. (They are teachers’ favorite gifts!)
4. Spoil extracurricular and support staff with their own collections
Sometimes individuals without a designated class and volunteer team get overlooked. We’re here to advocate: Remember your after-hours teams! One group organized a collection just for their custodial staff, and here’s a fine arts program that spotlighted its show directors. We love how you can’t miss who these gifts are for.
5. Raise money for a charitable group gift
Two schools caught our eye for their efforts to raise gift funds for their communities. One school raised money to sponsor children at their local Boys and Girls Club — another great use of our fundraising goal progress bar to showcase how much left to raise. Another elementary school changed things up with a Thanksgiving (as opposed to the winter holidays) gift card drive for their very own families.
6. Organize group gifts for weddings, baby showers and other celebrations
Here’s a baby shower collection we love, and here’s a group wedding gift. Why opt for Cheddar Up over Venmo or PayPal? Because at one glance, you can see how much you’ve raised specifically for this purpose. No more scrolling through your payment history hoping you didn’t miss anyone.
In short, before you go
Cheddar Up is an ideal spot for collecting money for a group gift, and we see a variety of coaches gifts, teacher gifts, holiday gifts, baby gifts, wedding gifts, and more each year. At one glance of your reporting center, you can see how much you’ve collected for this specific purpose (rather than scroll through a feed and add) — and because gifts are a timely manner, you can set a deadline that automatically closes your collection to new donations. Happy gift giving!
