3 Don’t Dos for Silent Auctions

I have been to many galas over my career, and I have a partner who loves, loves, loves a good silent auction. The name of the game with a silent auction is to make as much income as possible on each of your packages, but that goal can be undermined by a few innocent mistakes in planning packages. Below are a few don’t dos to make sure that you make the most on your auction items:

1.      Don’t sell gift cards individually. If you have a $25 gift card by itself people won’t pay more than $25 for it, and most won’t go for that much because guests like to think they are getting a deal. Bundle them into packages instead, with fun names like “Date Night for a Year”, or “Tour of Denver”. Guests usually won’t calculate the total of the gift cards in a bundle and are more likely to pay close to, or more than, face value.

2.      Don’t do a wine pull (or whisky pull). Alcohol typically sells for at least 90% of retail value, often over 100%, making it one of the most lucrative items for silent auctions. If you sell 40 bottles for $25 each in a wine pull, you top out your potential earnings at $1,000. Don’t put a cap on how much you can earn. Trust me, thanks to my partner, I have a bottle of gin in the bar that he paid a few hundred dollars for in a bidding war. It retails for about $30. He’s so darn proud that he won it.

3.      Avoid portrait photographers like the plague. Portrait photographers love to offer certificates for “free photo sessions” to non-profits. They do it to get folks into their studios and then ask them to pay huge amounts for the actual photographs. Unfortunately, this often leaves guests with a bad taste in their mouths from the experience. And you have given the photographer very cheap advertising, especially because these packages usually go for the minimum bid. My only exception is pet portrait photographers. Guests go ga-ga over pet photos.

Learn more about how you can create a successful silent auction by registering for my Gala Event Training, a two-day, deep dive into the best practices for fundraising Galas. Register today