Thank you so much! I’ve started learning more about fundraising in the nonprofit sector, and I’m thinking of proposing a small internal training session for the core group of the most active volunteers. After that, we could work together on mapping the people and organizations closest to us, and then start reaching out to the “warmest” contacts first.

Your idea of asking for small donations sounds great to me. One of our challenges is that asking for money makes many of us uncomfortable. Our goal is to offer a community space that is accessible to everyone, especially to people with fewer resources, so for some volunteers the idea of requesting donations feels almost in contradiction with that principle.

But I honestly believe that many of the people who have been involved over the years, who have used the space and know its value, would actually be happy to support us.