I find that your it is closer to 13/ of the total value of the auction but that is only 15 to 20 items compared to the 200 you may have out on tables for bidding.
I recomend no more than 20 item because of attention span, i do a buy it now price of 200% value on the silent items excluding local sports tickets which would sell for more than tha anyway. and my live items have large apeal, ie vaccations, principal for the day, wine tasteing dinners, helicoptor or senic plane ride. They tend to have a WOW factor.
it is true that your live auction should sell for more than 100% of its overall value. Remeber some items have zero $ value but bring in money while others have a high value that does not sell for as much.
Alwayse close your silent auction before you begin the live, You don't want people to get up to chack a bid on a 5$ GC when you really wnat them to bid on the $1000 vacation!
The amount of money you raise will directly come from the quality of your items. know your audiance, do good write ups that make the item a must have, and don't sell the donor, they are not the thing going home.
Our school does it differently. We do 'chinese auction' style. On average, each attendee spends $65 ( I got this number from doing data analysis of each years auction). Depending on # of attendees (which is contingent on size of venue), we have grossed anywhere from $22,000 to $41,000 from our event. Ticket prices are determined by value of basket. We like to give people the idea they are getting a bargain, and they are. I have won $1000 worth of orthodontia for my daughter simply by buying a $16 sheet of tickets. And we make money, so it's all good.
My nephews school (in NYC) grosses between $80 - $100K on their auction. (remember, it's Manhattan we are talking about here), and they do a combination of silent and live auction. My brother puts together a power point presentation of all the donations for the live auction. Lots of work but the rewards are huge.
I'm curious on other's experiences on auction's value. I'm debating live vs. silent, or 1/2 silent - 1/2 live, but I'm not sure how much time to give for silent before starting live, or which items to make live and if we'd be at a disadvantage for holding our festival at the same time and if that would detract from the auction happening later?
So many questions and options, with so little time.
Day with the Principal is the opportunity to "shadow" the Principal for an entire day, with the Principal letting the student sort of "Act as the Principal", being involved in some of the simple decisions and activities, etc., i.e., spending the entire day with the Principal, getting out of all the classes that day, eating lunch with the Principal, etc.
Regarding the silent auction...you prepare in advance bidding sheets for each item, with spaces for the bidders to enter their name and/or bidder number and the amount they are bidding, with the bidding going up in increments...similar to a live auction, but the bids are on on the bidding sheets, and the silent auction taking place over a period of time of say 1-2 hours, with a final cut off time for the final bids. High bidder wins the item, pay at the night of the auction, and collect the item that night. A silent auction is like a live auction, but just occurs over a longer period of time. A live auction...you bid at that moment...high bidder wins, then you go to the next live auction item.
Could someone explain the "Day with the Principal" thing. I'm not sure how to go about something like this.
Next.........During the silent auction do most people just tape a piece of paper in front of the item for bids. How do you then send the item home? Is it done that night or do you send a note home the next day requesting prompt payment?
Thanks for the great ideas. I never thought about people leaving after eating. OR the principal day. This is why I keeping coming back to this website!!!
