The Festival Challenge is a Provincial Grand Lodge initiative which seeks to encourage every Freemason in the Province to take part in a sponsored activity or event. Not only will all the sponsorship you raise contribute to your individual honorific level, but you’ll be rewarded with our new and exclusive Festival Challenge lapel pin.
When it comes to raising money through a sponsored event, you can join in on thousands of great challenges taking place all over the UK. There not all just walks, runs or bike rides either – you can skydive, swim or sail too.
If a gruelling physical challenge isn’t for you, consider hosting your own sponsorship event such as a bake sale, ladies or quiz night. You might want to slowly collect sponsorship with challenges such as a sponsored slim, stopping smoking or drinking wine (not for faint-hearted) which can be done over many months.
Collecting Sponsorship
When it comes to collecting sponsorship for your Festival Challenge event, we strongly recommend you use the MCF’s online fundraising page. You can send the link for your fundraising page to your family, friends and colleagues making it easy for them to sponsor you.
If you’d like to collect sponsorship the traditional way, you must collect donations using this Sponsorship Form, which is compliant with Gift Aid regulations and in a format the MCF can process. For more information, please visit our Fundraising page.
Step by Step Guide: Taking the Festival Challenge
Step 1.
Decide on your sponsored event. You could take part in a sponsored activity alone or do something different with friends and brethren.
Step 2.
To set up an online fundraising page, click here, or visit: https://mcf.org.uk/festival/buckinghamshire2021/ and select ‘create a fundraising page’. You’ll be asked to sign up using an email address or your Facebook account.
Step 3.
Personalise your new fundraising page. The best fundraising pages tell a really good story so let people know why you’re going to the trouble of raising money. Add your photo to make your new page much more engaging and post updates on your progress and upload new photos regularly.
Step 4.
Tell everyone you know! Send your page link to all your family, friends, brethren and colleagues so they can make a donation online. Add your page link to your email signature and share your link on the Provincial Facebook and Twitter pages. Around 40% of sponsorship comes in after people finish their event. So keep fundraising once you’ve crossed the finish line – it’s a good chance to email an update and a final appeal to your contacts!
Once you’ve set up your fundraising event, please let the Festival Chairman know by emailing: grahamdearing@aol.com or tell your area representative. You will then be sent the Festival challenge lapel pin. Wear it with pride and be part of a very exclusive club.