Charge your cups
Now it’s time to think about how you’ll raise those life-saving funds. Here are some ideas to create a stir and make your party a sweet success:
Sell cakes and sandwiches
For large cakes, you could sell the whole plate or sell by the slice. Use the labels in this pack to show a suggested donation for your cupcakes, snacks and sandwiches.
Ask for donation on the door
In your advertising or invitation you could ask people for a donation on entry.
Matched funding
If you are holding your tea party at work, ask your employer if they’ll offer matched funding. They may match part or all of the money you and your colleagues raise.
Fun and Games
Mix in some games or a quiz to your tea party and charge people to take part. It could be as simple as guess the weight of the cake, speed-decorating, or pay to enter a team in a tea themed quiz.
Hold a raffle, auction or tombola
You could ask local businesses for donations of prizes, or perhaps auction off promised pledged actions by your guests. Do you know anyone who is a master chef or who loves to spring clean?
Flights of fun and fancy
Why not raise some extra money and have some fun while you’re at it. By including some games at your tea party, you can let your imagination take flight! Here’s a helpful brew of ideas to get you started.
Guess the weight
Get your guests to pay to guess the weight of a cake, weigh it at the end of the tea party and the person with the closest guess wins a prize.
Blind tea tasting
Stock up on as many different types of tea as you can find and see how many your guests can recognise without being told what they are.
Tea quiz
You could make up some tea themed questions and ask your guests for a donation to enter your quiz. Make sure you have a tiebreaker question ready in case of a draw!
Tea cup treasure hunt
Print and cut out a batch of these tea cups and hide them around your tea party venue. Give your guests a window of time to find as many as possible, with a prize for the person who finds the most.
Sugar cube tower
Race against each other to balance a set number of sugar cubes on top of one another. Make it extra difficult by doing it while wearing rubber gloves!
Tea tray raffle
Before your tea party starts write down the coordinates of one of the squares on the tea tray raffle sheet and put the piece of paper in an envelope. During your tea party guests can make a donation to choose a square to write their name in. Only one name per square remember! Once all the squares have a name in, open your envelope to reveal the winning square: whoever’s name is written in that square wins! The prize could be something donated by a local business, a cake to take home, or half the money donated to the Tea Tray Raffle with the other half going to London’s Air Ambulance Charity.
Tea tray memory game
A fun game for children. Put a set number of items on a tray and cover them with a tea towel. Lift the towel for a minute to give players a chance to memorise all the items on the tray. The challenge is to remember as many items as possible once they’re covered again with the tea towel.
‘I’m a little teapot’ musical statues
Another fun game for little ones. Push the furniture back, put your favourite music on, and get up and dance. When the music is paused everyone must freeze in their best ‘I’m a little teapot’ pose. Anyone who accidently moves is out and the last person left wins!