Hi All, looking for some advice. I am currently looking to organise a community Christmas dinner in December. This is with the intention of it being for members of our town who may need a hot meal or just some company. we have a lot of families who rely on food banks in our area, and just a lot of people generally struggling. I have a lot of experience with charity fundraising, I used to do an annual fundraiser for local hospitals, animal shelters etc, but this is very different.

I have lots of local community centres and churches available for hire, I have already been in touch with a few and they are available, I am hoping some may offer a discounted price considering the cause

The main struggle at the minute is mainly the food storage/service. Most of the kitchens in our local facility have one oven, so cooking the whole meal there is not an option. We will have to pre-cook, transpor and reheat/serve there. I have reached out to local catering companies, some of which may be able to help with chafing dishes/bain Marie’s, so this is on the cards currently.

I would like to reach out to some event companies to see if they would be willing to help provide a bit of decoration, although if not I do think the community would rally with this

I would also like to see if anyone would be able to offer some Entertainment for a couple hours, such as a bouncy castle or face painting.

I am going to reach out to our local butchers and supermarkets to see if they would be willing to help with donating some meat/food

i am also going to reach out to some bigger national companies to see if they would be willing to donate some little gifts that we could have available, maybe even get a santa for the kids

and lastly, I am reaching out to some other local businesses to see if anyone would like to donate or sponsor the event. i am doing this completely independently (with a group of volunteers), so there will be costs and I may not get everything discounted/donated

to add, I have my food hygiene and public liability insurance.

I suppose my questions are -

Does anyone have any other suggestions to consider? Anything I haven’t thought of?

Has anyone ever done anything like this? Was it successful? Any dos/donts?

Do you think anyone would actually turn up? Whilst I know there are lots of financial hardships, I also know lots arent always up for these sorts of things. I would make sure I advertise in all the right places, and I would probably need to ticket it somehow (with a percentage kept for walk-ins) just to monitor numbers, but the event would be completely free