Research and More Research

It is so important to keep researching in order to find potential sponsors and donors. I subscribe to a lot of email newsletters and I'm constantly scanning different websites to find out about new businesses opening and to see who is sponsoring events, advertising and launching partnerships throughout the city. Research is easily a full time job. The internet is amazing with its vast source of information. It takes a long time to sift through everything and reach out to new potential partners. Today alone, I reached out to two potential donors that I found from email newsletters that I get. I can't imagine how people did research like this before the internet. The phone book must have been very important then. I really admire people who did my job before the internet. It must have been a very slow process.

I was searching for more information about getting a gift card donation from a retailer that has a store nearby when I found their parent company's grant application. I looked at their application and we fit well into their funding guidelines, so I decided to fill out the application this afternoon. It was a fairly simple and straight forward and I was able to get it done in less than 2 hours. I was so glad that I found this grant because I hadn't ever considered reaching out to this company for a donation. It takes a few months for them to review the grant, so it will be a while before I hear back from them with hopefully positive news. This was a good reminder that I need to keep working on finding new grant applications.

I ended up spending a considerable amount of time today wrapping up the big grant that I've been working on. I thought it wouldn't take very long, but I got bogged down with the budget portion of the grant. The written portion is finally done and I have the required attachments all set. All I have to do now is add my letters of support from participating departments. I can't wait to get it in the mail and move on to the next grant.

Well, that's the latest for tonight. I got caught up on a lot of emails tonight which I'm happy about. I also have more emails about stuffed animal donations that I need to respond to, but that will have to wait until tomorrow.  I just had my almost nightly grapefruit which was delicious! Until tomorrow friends...