35 Workplace Fundraising Ideas That Actually Work!

When you hear workplace fundraising, you might think of a jar for spare change or a bake sale in the break room. But today, office events are morphing into something much different, part team building, part community service, and part fun. With more companies getting involved in philanthropic endeavors, nonprofits are able to harness a new pool of supporters to better impact their local communities.

Workplace fundraising ideas are activities organized in offices to raise money for charities, enhancing team morale and corporate social responsibility in just a few simple steps.

And according to Forbes, corporate fundraising ideas aren’t just “nice add-ons” anymore. They estimate that 65% of companies now offer payroll giving or donation matching options for their employees. And this works for the company, it’s employees and the charity they’re rallying behind, not to mention the positive community impact it creates as well.

Why does this matter? Because easy ideas for small teams, or even big ones, are one of the simplest ways to bring people together in a way that matters both to them and the community. They give everyone a chance to step out of their normal routines, share a laugh, and raise money for something they care about in a significant way.

Here are a few quick stats to keep in mind:

• $5 billion is raised annually through workplace giving in the U.S.
• Companies with strong employee engagement see 21% higher profitability

• Nearly 6 in 10 (58%) of young professionals aged 18-34 gave through a workplace program

So, what does this look like in practice? Imagine...

• A trivia night in the office lounge.
• A charity run where your company fields its own team.
• A swear jar that prompts cash and laughs.
• A casual dress day that everyone actually looks forward to.
• A friendly office raffle with quirky prizes.

And that’s just scratching the surface. In this article, we’ll cover 51 fun workplace fundraising ideas, from quick and easy to larger, high impact events that can help you boost employee engagement and give back to the community at the same time.

35 Fun & Realistic Fundraising Ideas for the Workplace

Below we’ve given you the top 35 Fundraising Ideas for the Workplace from our experience with nonprofits. They range from quick and easy to a little more involved, but all of these ideas have the potential to raise some serious cash for your chosen charity. And while we lay out the basics of each one, please always feel free to tweak them to your corporate environment. And try to keep them as inclusive as possible so everyone can have a little fun!

Corporate Payroll Giving & Donation Based

1. Payroll Giving – This is a staple and one of the easiest ideas to implement since everything is automatic. Each employee contribute directly from their pre-tax salaries to a charity or you can even donate your pay. Even more powerful is getting your boss to agree to matching donations, which is when any donation given by an employee, say $5, is matched with the company giving the same $5.
2. Swear Jar – This is actually a lot of fun, and can even help people realize how often they say certain words. It doesn’t need to be just the bad ones, it can be overused buzzwords or any other banned words you decide. The fines go into a jar and the money is given to the charity of your choice.
3. Sponsored Silence – You could also call this Price for Peace since people will pay to keep the room quite, and if anyone makes a noise during the allotted time, they need to pay a fine. You can even get people to sponsor another person’s silence, say for an hour. And if they fail, then both persons need to pay the agreed to rate.
4. Sponsored Digital Detox – Tired of watching everyone on their phones in the office? Pay to keep people off devices per hour, watch them winching in their seats! If they cheat, then they need to chip in as well. This could be a lot of fun depending on who pays to keep who off their devices.
5. Pay to Leave Early – Who wouldn’t love to leave early! And I bet this could raise some serious cash, if your boss approves. You can even make it where you can take the entire day off for like $300, or leave an hour before for $20. You can even raffle off the privilege for one winner if your boss can’t afford to let everyone go home early.

Food & Drink

6. Bake Sale – Another philanthropic staple, the staff bakes treats to sell in the break room all day. Seasonal or themed bakes add variety.
7. Coffee Networking Morning – Coffee and pastries are sold for donations with conversation starters to encourage mingling. This is better for larger offices where not everyone knows each other.
8. Potluck Lunch – Colleagues bring dishes and then each person pays a small donation per plate to join in. Perfect for a Friday afternoon when people might ba able to take a longer lunch that usual making this a great networking activity as well.
9. Desk Declutter Sale – Employees donate gently used office supplies or small desk items (e.g., notebooks, mugs) for a workplace “yard sale.” Set up a table in a common area where staff can browse and buy stuff for $1 to $5 with all proceeds going to charity. Employees donate stuff in advance and volunteers manage the sale during lunch hours.
10. Doughnut Friday – Sell boxes or single doughnuts in the office throughout the day. You can pair this with a a pop up coffee cart in the office break room or lobby and offer premium coffee, tea or hot chocolate for more donations. You can theme your doughnuts by season if you have a great baker.
11. International Snack Day – Sell snacks from different countries or cultures, store bought or homemade, that employees bring in. Colleagues pay a donation to sample around the table. It’s fun, tasty and sparks conversation about traditions and travel. Something a little different.
12. Charity Cookbook – Collect recipes from staff and sell the printed or digital book.

Competitions & Games

13. Quiz Night – Teams pay to join trivia which can be company related or just common knowledge. Works well in-office, pubs, or virtually using a platform like Paybee’s. It’s a great way to get people together in a more casual setting while raising funds for your favorite charity.
14. Office Raffle – Collect donated prizes or have the boss pitch in some things, then sell raffle tickets throughout the day and pick winners just as everyone is about to go home.
15. Guess the Baby Photo – Staff submits their baby pictures and people pay a small fee for a guess. Each correct guess can get a small prize or just the satisfaction of being able to spot their fellow employees at any age.
16. Guess the Number of Sweets – Fill a jar with candies and colleagues pay per guess to win the jar. You can use whatever you want especially if you can get it to align with your company’s product line. Super easy and fun.
17. Office Bingo – Use workplace scenarios like “printer jam” or “coffee cart” as squares and make a bunch of copies. Buy in is per card and offer small cash or other types of prizes. You can even make this common phrases people say around the office.
18. Office Scavenger Hunt – Teams or individuals pay to enter and look for all sorts of stuff throughout the office. You can either make it where the person who finds the item can keep it, or one prize for the person or team that finds the most stuff.
19. Board Game Tournament – Play classics like Monopoly or chess for an entry fee per player. This works well when there is a ‘pot’ that the last man (or woman) standing can win.
20. Minute-to-Win-It Challenges – Set up a list of silly 60 second office friendly games like stacking cups, balancing pens, or a marshmallow toss. Colleagues donate to play and points add up toward a grand prize. Great for injecting energy and laughter into the workday.
21. Office Escape Challenge (Tabletop Style) – Create a set of logic riddles and clues and mini-puzzles for teams to solve within a time limit like a mini escape room, but seated at their desks. Teams pay to enter and the fastest one wins. Safe, cerebral, and still exciting. Do this on a Friday when everyone really wants to get home to put a little pressure on it.
22. “Two Truths and a Lie” Contest – Colleagues submit two true facts and one lie about themselves. Everyone donates to guess which is the lie with winners getting small prizes. It’s a great icebreaker and builds team bonding while raising funds.

Creative & Fun Challenges

23. Talent Show – If you have a creative team why not let them show off their talents? You can hold this event in your office or at the local pub. Each staff member performs for the audience and pays an entry fee to join or vote by donation.
24. Karaoke Night – Colleagues sing for charity. Pay per song or vote for the best or worst in order to bring in more funds. This will require a karaoke machine and space to hold your event. Not as easy as some others, but it can raise a nice sum of money and is always a lot of fun.
25. Charity Dance Off – Teams or individuals compete with dance routines. Donations to vote for winners.
26. Charity Comedy Night – Staff try stand up comedy or short sketches in order to bring in funds. Sell tickets at the door and get ready for a fun filled evening.

Office Themed Events

23. Office Olympics – Chair races, paper plane contests or desk chair relays are all ways of creating some fun and chaos. Think Brooklyn 99’s shenanigans. Charge a small entry fee and offer something like leaving the office two hours early as a prize with no costs!
24. Themed Fancy Dress Day – Pay to dress up any way you want, but something funny like superheroes, retro 70’s and so on. Then sell cheap raffle tickets where people write the names of the best dressed to win a vote.
25. Desk Decorating Contests – Perfect for special times like Easter or Christmas if you can tie them in. Participants pay a small fee to decorate their workspaces to a theme. Voting by donations.
26. Office Mini-Golf Day – Transform the workplace into a makeshift mini-golf course using hallways, conference rooms and cubicle lanes to mimic a real golf tournament. Trash bins can serve as “sand traps,” stacks of files as the “rough,” and office chairs as creative obstacles. Colleagues or departments pay an entry fee to compete, keeping score on a “par” system just like the real game. You can even set up a “closest to the pin” putting challenge or a “hole-in-one” contest for bonus donations. Prizes go to the lowest scorer, the most creative shot, and the funniest fail.
27. Easter Egg Hunt – Host a workplace egg hunt where small chocolate eggs, candy, or tokens are hidden around the office and given as a gift. Staff pays a small entry fee to participate with special prizes for finding golden eggs or most eggs found. For hybrid or remote teams, adapt it into a virtual scavenger hunt with riddles, photo clues, or hidden icons in online documents or slides.
28. Office Pet Day – Give colleagues the chance to show off their pets while raising money for a cause. Staff donate to bring in their pets for a day (if your workplace allows it), or share their photos and videos virtually. Add fun contests like Cutest Pet, Most Mischievous or Best Dressed with donations used as votes.

Active & Wellness

23. Sponsored Walk or Run – Employees commit to walking or running a set distance similar to a walk-a-thon either individually or as a team. Each person or team finds their own sponsors who give by the mile. The event can be held during a weekend or after work or it can even be done virtually with participants tracking their progress through apps.
24. Charity Football Tournament – Departments or teams form small football (soccer) squads to compete in a friendly tournament. Entry fees are collected from players while colleagues and friends can donate or purchase spectator tickets.
25. Sponsored Fitness Challenge – Staff commit to personal health or fitness goals such as daily push-ups, step targets or weight loss milestones. Each participant secures their own sponsorships to support their journey. Progress is tracked over weeks or months with leaderboards or progress charts displayed to keep everyone’s motivation as high as possible.

Real-Life Wins

It’s one thing to imagine doing one of these ideas and it’s another to see how other employees have used them in real life scenarios. So we’ve included two real life case studies just to demonstrate the power these ideas have to fund your favorite charity.

• “Students Demand Action raised $750 through a bake sale tied to Wear Orange Day” (source link).
• “Dan Pallotta’s first California AIDS Ride biked from San Francisco to Los Angeles—and netted over $1 million in 1991 alone” (source link).

Case Study 1: Bake Sale for Firearm Safety – Students Demand Action

At a high school club called Students Demand Action, members wanted to raise awareness for gun safety. They hosted a bake sale in June 2023 (tied to Wear Orange Day, a national gun violence awareness campaign), and pulled in approximately $750 for the nonprofit Everytown for Gun Safety. That’s $750 from cookies and cupcakes, simple, real, and powerful.

Why it works:

• Low effort, high participation.
• Tied to a timely awareness event.
• Clear, emotional cause motivates action.

Case Study 2: Bike Ride Fundraising by Pallotta TeamWorks

Here’s a major example of workplace adjacent fundraising turned big. In 1991, Dan Pallotta launched the California AIDS Ride, a roughly 600 mile bike ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles. With 478 participants, it raised over $1 million net in its first year. Over the next nine years, similar rides across cities brought in a total of $108 million after expenses.

Why it matters:

• Shows how scaling a simple idea (bike ride) into a multi-city event can create massive impact.
• It introduces the idea that workplace or community events can evolve into deeply meaningful philanthropy.

How to Run a Fundraiser at Work (Step-by-Step)

So now that you have thirty five great ideas for practically any scenario, it’s time to breath some life into your choice. Just follow each step to put any of these ideas into action and create a massively successful office fundraiser.

Step 1: Pick the right idea for your team size and culture.

You will really need to think about how our ideas align with your company or organization, its culture and of course your fellow employees. If most of the company are coach potatoes, then a 5k charity run may not be the ideal fit. The same goes for trying to hold a charity football game, yet your office only has three employees. So think realistically what people would actually enjoy, food, games, competitions and start there.

Step 2: Set a clear goal.

You’re going to need to have a basic idea of how much money you’d like to raise for your cause. This is important for a few reasons. First, when talking to your fellow employees or corporate partners you don’t want to say, “let’s raise some money for charity,” it’s too generic. Rather say “let’s raise $500 to support the local food bank,” this is so much more motivating for people and corporate partnerships. Second, when you have a goal, you’ll instinctively work harder to achieve it, and so will your co-workers. And third, it’s tough to know if you were successful or not if you don’t have an end point. Nor will you know how to improve next time if you don’t know what the goal was. So set a ‘real’ goal, and be realistic!

Step 3: Get leadership participation and communicate clearly.

You want to get as many upper-management people as possible supporting your event. People are much more likely to show up and participate if they know the boss is going to be there. So announce your fundraiser as early as possible and explain why it matters. Use the company email, Slack, posters in the break room, whatever you have at your disposal so no one misses it.

Step 4: Make participation easy.

The easier your event is to sign up and attend, the more willing people will be to be a part of it. Using online sign-ups or forms, payroll deductions and corporate sponsors, or a QR code on a flyer that links directly to a donation page can remove friction that would otherwise turn off individuals from participating in your fundraising event. Make it obvious about how they can help and you’ll have more attendees than if they need to hunt for the information.

Step 5: Celebrate results and thank everyone.

Your follow up is just as important as the event, especially if you think you’ll want to hold other events. So let everyone know if your goals were reached and how their support will help someone in need. Send a quick thank-you email, hold a team lunch or even give a shout out at the next company meeting. Letting people know how grateful you are for their support helps them feel good about contributing, and makes them more likely to show up for the next fundraiser.

Frequently Asked Questions on Our Fundraising Ideas 

1. What are some low cost Ideas for the Workplace?
Food sales, swear jars, trivia contest, or small raffles keep your costs down.

2. How can remote teams participate in workplace fundraising ideas?
Virtual challenges, online auctions, livestreamed events, and peer-to-peer donations work well.

3. Are there tax benefits to a workplace fundraising idea?
Yes, donations to registered charities may be tax deductible.

4. How does holding one of these events improve my company culture?
They strengthen personal connections and highlight shared values.

5. What are trending ideas for 2026?
Hybrid events, eco-friendly drives, gamified apps, and wellness challenges are all trending.

Final Thoughts

Workplace fundraising doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive to organise, you just need a little creativity to make it inclusive and fun. Whether it’s a pot luck lunch, trivia night, or full scale charity challenge, these ideas help to bring everyone closer together and strengthen your company culture in extremely positive ways. It shows you about more than just profits, you’re a business committed in improving not just the lives of your employees, but the greater community as a whole. So pick an idea and run with it, no matter how it turns out, there’s bound to be some laughs and a bit of money for your favorite cause.

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