text: So you want to raise funds for your group by having a raffle. Here are some questions that you probably should ask yourself:\n\n - How much money do you want to raise?\n - How much money do you want to spend to raise the amount in the first question?\n - Who will be likely to buy raffle tickets?\n -  How many raffle tickets do we expect to sell?\n\nMany local businesses might be willing to donate merchandise or services as prizes for your raffle in exchange for some advertising. If you are thinking of having lots of small to medium prizes, check with your local Starbucks - they often will give out gift cards for groups as raffle prizes. Also check with smoothie places. For nicer prizes, perhaps companies can donate items for gift baskets - like movie tickets or spa coupons or fancy snacks or gift cards to different local stores. For really high-end prizes, check with car dealerships for cars or travel agents for travel packages.\n\nOnce you have a grand prize or set of prizes, you can price the tickets - perhaps $1 for a chance to win something in the $10-$50 range or upwards of $25 for a chance to win a trip or a car. If you are selling $1 tickets, you can probably get by with just having a cashbox at a booth and a roll of tickets, and just have "must be present when the number is announced to win". but for high end prizes, you should probably be able to accept checks, make special custom tickets, and get full contact information for ticket buyers, to let them know if they win.\n\nLocal businesses love to say that they give back to the community, and one way they do that is to donate stuff for community and school groups that raffle off the the stuff for fundraisers. So check with your local businesses - perhaps you might be raffling movie tickets or gift cards for the mall or an iPod or a weekend trip for two to a local resort. make sure you raffle off something that people want. if people aren't interested in your prize, they might not be willing to buy a ticket.\n\ngood luck!