Events
How do you fund a community event with crowdfunding?
Fund a festival, a fair or a meetup: list what the day costs, set a goal your neighbours can fill, and thank backers with rewards on the day.
Short answer
Run the event as one campaign with a budget, a goal and a deadline weeks before the day. List what the day really costs, set the goal at that total plus fees, and offer rewards people enjoy at the event: a name on the sponsor board, a seat at the front, the festival shirt. Ask the people who will be there first, then the shops that gain from the crowd. If the goal is met, the organiser claims the funds; if not, every backer takes their pledge back.
Key facts
- One campaign for one event: a story, a goal, a deadline and rewards.
- No association, no company and no approval queue on our side. One adult signs up with email or Google.
- Set the deadline well before the day, so you know in time whether it goes ahead.
- All or nothing: miss the goal and backers take their pledge back.
- Each pledge pays 1.5% plus a flat $0.99.
What does a community event actually cost?
More than one person should pay, and less than people fear once it is written down. List every line before you pick a number.
- Stage, marquee or a covered space.
- Sound system, lights and someone to run them.
- Chairs, tables, bins and toilets.
- Power: a generator or a connection for the day.
- Insurance and what your town charges for the event itself.
- Posters, wristbands and the sponsor board.
- A fee for the band, the DJ or the speaker.
- The rewards, and sending any that travel.
Check what your town requires for the event itself, and add any cost that brings.
How big should the goal be?
The total of your cost lines, plus the fees and a small cushion for the day. Not a round wish.
For example: stage and sound $600, chairs, tables and bins $200, printing and the sponsor board $150, rewards $150. That is $1,100. Add a little for fees and the unexpected and the goal is about $1,200. Then check it against the crowd you know: 120 neighbours backing at an average of $10 makes $1,200. The goal planner does that sum for you.
What rewards fit a community event?
Rewards that are part of the day, cheap to make and only for backers:
- Your name on the sponsor board at the entrance.
- A reserved seat at the front for the concert or the talk.
- The event shirt or tote bag, collected on the day.
- A drink or food token at the stalls.
- A thank you from the stage, read out with the backers' names.
- A photo of the day, sent to every backer after.
- For a local business: its logo on the posters and a stall at the fair.
You can offer up to five levels. Put the smallest at the minimum pledge, $10, so everyone on the street can join in. The reward tier planner checks what each level leaves after its cost.
Who should you ask first?
The people who will be there: last year's crowd, the neighbours on the street, the performers' friends and the shops that gain from the footfall. They fill the first part of the goal, and strangers follow a campaign that is already moving.
- Print the link as a QR code on every poster and flyer.
- Post it in the street's group chat and on the local page.
- Ask each performer and each stallholder to share it once.
- Visit the cafés and shops in person, with the sponsor level in hand.
Backers can pay by card or in USDC. You can also set a share reward, from nothing up to 18.5% of each pledge a shared link brings, paid by the program in the same transaction. For a neighbourhood event a low one, or none, is fine. How to share your campaign covers the first week.
Do you need an association to run the campaign?
Not on our side. A campaign needs no association, no company and no approval queue: one adult signs up with email or Google, writes it and publishes.
The campaign belongs to that one person, and the funds go to their own wallet. So the organising group should agree who runs it before you publish, and say so in the story, with the budget. Raising money without the paperwork has the rest.
What does the campaign cost?
Writing and previewing a campaign costs nothing, and opening it costs $5 on the free plan. Each pledge pays 1.5% plus a flat $0.99, and any share reward you set comes out of the pledge too.
The percentage fee on a pledge follows the plan of the account making it. It's taken when the pledge is made, so it isn't returned if the campaign misses its goal. Paid plans aren't on sale today, so the published fee is the free plan's fee.
The fee calculator shows what a pledge leaves the event.
What if the goal is missed?
If the goal isn't met by the deadline, you take your pledge back from escrow with one tap, and nobody has to approve it. What comes back is the amount held for you: your pledge minus the fees taken when you backed (the platform fee, the flat fee, any tip and any share reward the campaign pays).
That is why the deadline sits weeks before the day: you know whether the event is paid for before you book the stage.
How do you start?
- Agree in the group who runs the campaign.
- Write down every cost line and add them up.
- Sign up in the app with email or Google.
- Write the story, the goal, a deadline weeks before the event and the rewards.
- Preview it, publish, and put the QR code on the first poster.
Everything you can fund has a guide for each kind of project, and every other question is in the answers.