If you need volunteers for your next fundraising event, One Brick is there for you. One Brick is a non-profit “community of volunteers that support other local nonprofits by creating a friendly and social atmosphere around volunteering.”
In short: they are an on-demand army of volunteers waiting to help with your next fundraising event. One Brick has chapters in the San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle, New York, Boston, Chicago, New Orleans, and Washington D.C.
They accept applications for volunteers a minimum of six to eight weeks in advance of your event, and their volunteers will only work two- to four-hour shifts. They also only volunteer for weeknight or weekend events. If your organization is new to them, they’ll want to get to know you before sending a team to your event. See their guidelines below for more detailed information.
If you are in San Francisco, you can request help via an email containing the below “Information We’ll Require”. To find the One Brick chapter nearest you, visit their website: https://onebrick.org/request-help
Following are their guidelines for engagement:
ONE BRICK GENERAL GUIDELINES
· We typically work 2-4 hour shifts. If your event is longer than this, do consider breaking out the volunteer responsibilities into shifts. One Brick can then take responsibility for bringing volunteers to one of the shifts. (Rarely will we be able to arrange to cover multiple shifts.)
· While we are there to volunteer, we do try to incorporate a social element, enabling volunteers to chat with one another while working together. Activities that are conducive to this are preferred.
· One Brick will provide an event manager at every event to help mobilize the volunteers and keep things running smoothly. A representative from your organization must be present at all times as well.
TIMING
· One Brick requires a minimum of 6-8 weeks notice to consider requests for volunteer support. We are sometimes able to accommodate requests with less lead time if we do not have any conflicting events during the time you need and we can secure an Event Manager and Coordinator to oversee your event.
· As One Brick is completely volunteer-run, we generally limit our events to weeknights and weekends.
· Please also understand it may sometimes take a few days to respond to your request, as we pass information across our team to determine if we will be able to coordinate coverage for your event.
INFORMATION WE'LL REQUIRE
· If we have not worked with your organization in the past, a short bio on your organization and its mission.
· A short description of what we will be doing during the project and how this benefits the overall effort.
· If it has been an ongoing project, please provide a little history about the project itself.
· How many volunteers you will need.
· Dates and times you will need volunteers.
· A clear meeting place.
· Special instructions such as parking or clothing to wear, etc.
· Directions to the site.
· Contact name, telephone and email of the person we will interface with at the site.
· Anything else of note that you would like volunteers to be aware of.
SETTING UP AN EVENT
If you have a project is within our guidelines please send us an email containing the above "Information We'll Require."
HELP SPREAD THE WORD...
Once we've set up an event for you, we'd appreciate your help spreading the word about One Brick. Please list/thank us in your newsletter, email outreach, or event website.
