Charity website idea

[cianosheehan]

I've saved my 1000th post as first thread for EDF, and hopefully a good cause too.

I was playing with the idea of setting up a charity website, and thought I'd post it here to see what kind of thoughts people could add.

The basic premise of the site is that it's based around peoples change jars ("Change" jars, get it?)....hear me out

I dont know if its the same where you are from, but over here people collect money on the street for whatever charity they're working for. Just a guy standing by the road hoping people will throw some change into his bucket.

This is fairly inefficient, he'd have to stand there for hours to get any significant amount of money from passers by.

If there was a site set up that encouraged people to donate their change jars, it would be a much better use of the collectors time.

The way I figure it could work would be;
Donator sends an email or makes a call saying they want to donate.
Local collector goes to their house/office whatever, to pick up the cash.
Donator gets a thank you gift, and a warm fuzzy feeling
Collector has just earned what he'd take in a whole day on the side of the road, in a matter of minutes.

I figure you could create something with the website as well...make a list of donators, and they could put up a link of their choice if they wanted, to attract business involvement. Or donators could remain anonymous. You could also include info on the charities involved, give some background stories and pictures on how the money is being put to use.

Of course people usually throw money into collectors buckets because it's loose change they have as they're coming out of a store or whatever. But even one person inspired to donate a change jar would make up for a lot of passers-by.

Thoughts?

[El Diablo]

ciao,

Maybe you could pitch something like this to CoinStar? I think the concept is pretty sound.

[Evan]

[ QUOTE ]
ciao,

Maybe you could pitch something like this to CoinStar? I think the concept is pretty sound.

[/ QUOTE ]
I believe coinstar already has charities you can donate to. I have no idea what they are or if the fees they charge to be included are worth it, but it's being done in some degree. If there was some way to combine the automated interface of coinstar with the customer's ability to choose where the money goes (out of more than the one or two options coinstar might give you), that would probably be a great product.

[danvh]

Maybe instead of change, ask people to send in gift cards that have like 3 bucks left on them..I know I have a few that for what ever reason I didnt spend everything on it..

Seems like you could collect these or even sell them back to the store so they can close out books..