The best way to put it is that the Flood Aquatics Swim Team crushed their USA Swimming Foundation Swim-A-Thon fundraising goals and it was their first time running it on the TUMoney system! Not only did they have to bump their initial goals up by $5,000, but they still exceeded it and went above the $15,000 mark. We are so proud of them in their team's efforts. They have 38 accounts and just under 60 athletes in the water. That means that each athlete on average collected over $275.That is huge for their team!

Liz Fizer, customer success representative here at TeamUnify, talked one-on-one with the club administrator. When asking what their secret to success was, Emily told us that there were three major event keys to success:

1. Weekly prizes to drive engagement
2. A raffle the day of the event where tickets were based on athlete fundraising
3. Weekly emails to parents on how the funds would be spent

However, beyond just running the event well, she attributed it to the great leadership, an amazing buy in to the programs' goals, and a coach that is dedicated to building swimmers and athletes in and out of the water.

We had a fantastic fundraiser. Our original goal was $7,000 since our team is small. Two weeks into the event, I had to change the goal to $12,000. On the day of the actual Swim-A-Thon, we were past the $15,000 mark!! I believe there were 3 major keys to our success. 

First, keeping the swimmers engaged and excited was very important. We wanted them to have more involvement than just emails. We set up weekly prizes given at practice. These were simple things we found at the dollar store and $5 gift cards. They were given as mystery prizes. For example, one week we gave a prize to the top sibling group in fundraising, one for who sent the most emails per group, and who could say how much they raised to the closest dollar. The kids enjoyed the simple recognition and it kept them engaged. 

Second, we had a raffle table the day of the event. For every $10 the swimmer raised, they earned a ticket to use in the raffle. We had many different items for the swimmers to choose to enter. Some of the prizes were a themed basket, gear bags, coach for a day certificates, private lessons, group pizza party, and movie gift cards. This kept the kids wanting to raise money for tickets! 

Third, we communicated weekly with the parents different ways the funds would be spent. This kept the purpose of the event relative for the parents. As they understood how much the swimmers would benefit from their donations, they participated more. Each week we would spotlight a piece of equipment we would purchase or an area that the funds would go toward. After each of these emails, we would see a huge spike in fundraising efforts.

In the end, we had close to 100% participation. It was easy with the platform from TeamUnify and our team is excited to swim fast this season!

-Emily Edward

Flood Aquatics Swim Team | West Palm Beach, Florida

Flood Aquatics Swim Team (FAST) is located on the beautiful campus of The King's Academy in West Palm Beach. FAST is a year-round competitive swim club offering professional coaching. They are part of USA Swimming and compete in the Florida Gold Coast (FGC).

FAST has been using the TeamUnify platform since January of 2016 and ran their first USA Swimming Foundation Swim-A-Thon Fundraiser on June 3rd of 2017. They have 58 swimmers and 38 accounts as of June 2017.

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