Holidays are the best time to raise money for your film -- people are in that giving mood already.
If your project qualifies, you can even offer your donors a tax-deduction, but you'll need to have a nonprofit be your fiscal sponsor. You can get fiscal sponsorship status with film orgs like Film Arts Foundation or Bay Area Video Coalition (both in San Francisco), or IFP (chapters in NY, Seattle and Minneapolis).
Even if you don't bother with the nonprofit fiscal sponsorship, you should still ask for donations. Just be clear that they are not tax-deductible charitable contributions.
For Quality of Life, we basically sold credits. For $75, we would put your name in the credits. We sent out mailings to all our family and friends and colleagues and ANYONE -- both via email and real paper snail mail (just like we were a real arts program).
We raised $5,000 just through these contributions. That was enough for us to buy our film stock.
Don't let the holidays go by without doing this! You'll raise so much more when people are in the giving spirit. Also, when you see family and friends over the holidays, you'll be able to (politely) strong-arm or at least remind them that you still haven't seen that contribution check....
The most important thing to remember is that people WANT to see you make your movie and they want to help. They might not have a million dollars to give you to invest, but Aunt Mary will gladly write you a $75 check.
You just need to ask.
Comments