Okay folks, I have a harebrained idea. You either have to help me figure out how to do it or tell me I am crazy for even considering it. I had planned something else for today’s post, but then this idea burst into my brain this afternoon–and I’ve been kicking it up and down the stairs ever since.
The idea is the Three Million Dollar March. I’d like to launch it June 9 and use the initial income for the Marathon Walk on September 9.
The details: We now suspect that NET is NOT a rare disease. We think there may be as many as three million Americans walking around with NET right now–just under one percent of the population. Most will never know they had it because it will cause something else that their deaths will actually be attributed to: heart disease and aggressive forms of lung, breast, or prostate cancer being the most obvious examples. But all of those were really caused by the underlying NET that will never be discovered.
Last year, we spent barely $3 million on NET research. That’s about $1 for every potential case of NET out there. The idea is to double that amount by getting 3 million people to donate $1 each.
The idea grows out of two things I saw in the last 10 months. In September, I was at a yard sale at a friend’s house trying to sell Walking with Jane items. It was not going well. After noon, I changed tactics and just asked each person who came through for a $1 donation–for which I gave them a Walking with Jane button. We did over $200 in four hours.
At an ACS leadership event, we were asked what we thought was the simplest way to raise money. One group decided to try their idea. They went around the room and asked each person there for $1–and no one said no. And they were not handing out buttons.
How do we get three million people to give us $1?
The point of the exercise is more than the dollar, though. It gives us three million more people who have at least heard of NET and Walking with Jane.
The question is, how do we make this work? Obviously, mailings and credit cards are counter-productive–we’d eat up all the money raised in stamps and credit card fees–it almost has to be a door-to-door effort. But you may have other thoughts.
And of course, we won’t say no to larger donations. But the key needs to be three million people and three million dollars.
Clearly, I don’t expect to raise $3 million in three months–though that would be mind-blowing. But is that figure possible over the course of the 12 months that starts June 9?
Thoughts?
