Home > Blog > Live Auctions > The Golden Ticket Raffle
Who wouldn’t want to win the first pick of all the Live Auction items?
We are huge fans of this amazing Revenue Generator. And your guests will be, too!
Here’s how The Golden Ticket works.
There are 100 tickets for sale at $100 each, and attendees can buy as many tickets as they like until the winner is drawn at the very top of the Live Auction.
Whoever wins gets first dibs on ANY of the amazing Live Auction packages. Any of them!
That’s 100 tickets for $100 each, so The Golden Ticket can raise $10,000, and we see organizations sell out of tickets all the time.
Our strategy to selling out is to start promoting the Golden Ticket Raffle WEEKS IN ADVANCE. And to generate even more excitement, we recommend including a Sneak Preview of all the live auction items in your promotional materials, so your audience will be eager to buy their Golden Tickets the moment they arrive.
The winner has to be present to choose their prize, but according to Oregon law, you aren’t allowed to make it a rule that someone must be present to win.
So the answer is: don’t put your tickets on sale until the event actually begins.
That way you’ll be certain all ticket buyers are present and accounted for. Which means... you have to sell all of your tickets during Cocktail Hour!
And to make sure this happens, you’re going to need to enlist the help of several volunteers.
It’s important to choose folks who are super friendly and able to approach strangers and encourage them to purchase their Golden Tickets.
Now, one way I like to help volunteers think about their pitch that night is kind of like this:
“In The Golden Ticket Raffle, each ticket may be a slightly higher price than the tickets for other raffles, but that’s the price you pay for gaining a chance to win first dibs on the incredible prize like, let’s say it’s a vacation to Paris. So think about that: Paris for $100! And don’t forget they are only selling 100 tickets available, so your odds are great, and they will sell out quickly, so don’t wait to buy! If you want to really improve your odds, how ‘bout you buy a few tickets??”
And the great thing about The Golden Ticket is that it’s a revenue enhancer that scales really well.
You could try to sell 200 tickets at $50 each and still go for the $10,000.
Or maybe stick with 100 tickets but set the price at $50 knowing your top revenue for the raffle would land at $5,000. That’s still great!
And a great way to calculate your potential sales is by looking at your number of bid units.
If this is your first raffle, it is critical that you check in with your State’s Department of Justice, Charitable Gaming Division. Each state is different, so just be 100% certain that you are following your local raffle licensing laws.
Ready for the advanced version?
Now, let's go raise some money!!