Let Your Supporters’ Travel Raise Money
Most likely, your members or supporters are already spending money annually on personal vacation travel. Departure Lounge’s Travel Fundraiser program enables your organization to receive funds from those travel bookings while providing your supporters with expert travel planning and special upgrades and perks.
If you have members or supporters who are four-star or five-star travelers, Departure Lounge has a fundraiser program that can be a WIN-WIN-WIN for your organization, your supporters and Departure Lounge.
In short, if your organization is approved by Departure Lounge as a brand-appropriate non-profit, education or charitable partner and you have marketing platforms in place to communicate to your constituents, then Departure Lounge will pay you 10% of gross commission earned on all bookings resulting from your promotion efforts to your organization.
Departure Lounge currently partners with Texas Exes, the alumni association of The University of Texas, and with Whole Planet Foundation, the primary foundation of Whole Foods Markets. Those organizations promote the travel planning services of Departure Lounge, and the travel agency donates 10% of gross commission received from travel bookings back to those organizations. The real winners are the travelers, who enjoy the complimentary upgrades and perks secured for them by Departure Lounge travel advisors. Your supporters can generate funds for your organization without purchasing material items and without spending any money they wouldn’t have already spent on travel. Departure Lounge does not charge travel-planning fees and does not add expense to the travel.
Schools, alumni groups, non-profits and charitable community groups are ideal for this fundraising approach.
How would a Fundraiser Program with Departure Lounge work? We would establish a special email address for your constituents to use when requesting help with booking their personal travel, or they can call us and identify themselves as being part of your organization. Then we code them in our database. From that point forward, your organization will receive 10% of gross travel agency commission earned on travel bookings. That roughly translates to 1% of the total gross travel sales.
Departure Lounge’s average vacation booking is $12,000, so that booked trip would generate $120 for your organization. If you believe your constituents can generate $250,000 or more in annual travel bookings (roughly 20 trips), then your organization could be a great fit for a travel fundraiser.
The following criteria determine if an organization is a good fit for this fundraiser strategy:
Departure Lounge Travel Fundraiser Partner Criteria
| Number & Caliber Of Constituents | Travel Habits | Marketing/Communications Platform(s) |
|---|---|---|
| If your group is made up of 100 or more affluent, engaged participants, our fundraiser program could be a great fit. | If your group includes several avid travelers who enjoy international vacations, cruises and tours at 4- and 5-star levels, and these travelers love complimentary upgrades and perks, our program is ideal. | Your organization must have marketing and communications platforms and/or gatherings in which you can regularly promote the fundraiser partnership and drive your constituents to utilize Departure Lounge to reserve their personal travel. Departure Lounge will not purchase advertising — the organization must provide and mange the promotion of the program. |