It’s undeniable that we’re a nation of sport lovers. Wherever you are in Australia on any given weekend there will be a sports game in-play somewhere close by, whether it’s in your local community or on your TV. We love playing it, watching it and more recently, donating to it.

How often we open our wallets for sport is on the rise, as is how much we give. In the last financial year alone, $44.75 million was donated to Australian sports clubs, organisations and athletes through the Australian Sports Foundation.

To find out more about why donations to sport are increasing we recently spoke with Sandra Sweeney, Chief Marketing and Technology Officer at the Australian Sports Foundation.

For more than 30 years the Australian Sports Foundation has helped sports clubs, community groups and athletes to fundraise for the sports they love.

Around $300 million has been raised since the Sports Foundation was first established but in the last financial year alone (2016-17) a record breaking $44.75 million has poured in.

“Over the past three years we’ve concentrated on transforming the Sports Foundation and providing a better fundraising offering to sport,” says Sandra. “We have seen huge growth in fundraising capability and success for sports clubs, schools, community groups and athletes – from the amateur to elite level, including a handful of Olympians.”

“In 2014 we raised $17 million but in 2016 we raised $32 million, and in the past financial year we exceeded that again.”

Funds raised last year were donated to 1,149 organisations and 179 athletes which helped a total of 2,328 projects, almost 1,000 more than the previous year.  Around 61 per cent of donations were directed to grassroots clubs – another record for the Sports Foundation.

“The growth has meant more opportunities for people to participate in sport, at all levels and in many more communities around Australia,” says Sandra.

Programs which focus on social inclusion in sport were also a winner. More than $2.4 million was raised last financial year to fund programs for disadvantaged communities, people with disability, women and girls, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and the LGBTQ+ community.

Enabling Philanthropic Support

The Australian Sports Foundation enables Australian sports clubs, peak bodies, schools, community groups and athletes, who are signed up with the Sports Foundation, to gain tax-deductible status for donations to sports projects.

More than 2,500 projects and 1,300 organisations and athletes are currently fundraising through the Sports Foundation for their own initiatives – from hosting sports events and participation programs to upgrading facilities, supporting staff costs and participating in high performance programs.

All partners receive support from the Sports Foundation to help them fundraise and grow their profile. They also benefit from their own fundraising page on the Sports Foundation’s website, which includes an online donation facility.

“In the case of local clubs or schools, often if they don’t fundraise they won’t have what they need to exist. In some cases, they can’t run their programs, fund coaches or get the kids to the sports venue,” explains Sandra.

“One of the ways we’re helping the development of sport in Australia is through these local sports groups. The fundraising is keeping their club or school sports program alive – they wouldn’t be able to do it any other way.”

One example is Balga High School (BSHS) in Western Australia. The school specialises in intensive literacy and numeracy education for their culturally diverse student population.

To assist students to participate in sport at school, club and representative levels BSHS signed up to the Australian Sports Foundation. Their aim was to alleviate the major barrier to participation for students: the cost. Funds raised via the Sports Foundation were used to cover uniforms and shoes, travel costs to and from sports events and registration expenses. The school’s original target of $15,000 was exceeded with the project raising close to $22,000.

Giving for Grassroots

The Australian Sports Foundation also runs its own small grants program, focused on helping community based organisations to carry out programs that increase participation in sport nation-wide.

Funds for the grants are generously donated by members of the wider sports-passionate Australian community, including through workplace giving.

Workplace givers, signed up to the Good2Give platform, have the choice to support a sports program, organisation or athlete of their choice (if they are signed up to the Sports Foundation) or the Giving for Grassroots program. Funds are channelled through the Sports Foundation and allocated to the grant recipients.

“Each grant round has a theme and they are awarded based on a set of criteria,” says Sandra.

“We are able to give grants of $2,000 to $10,000, depending on the round and we can receive up to 2,500 applications. Over the past three years we’ve provided 1,200 grants thanks to our generous donors, who are both individuals and corporates.”

Donating to our Way of Life

The Australian Sports Foundation has been through substantial change over the last three years and attribute the growth in donations to a variety of reasons:

• Increased digital capabilities and resources to offer more support to fundraising activities
• Dedicated Sports Partnership Managers for projects and regions
• Separating operationally and strategically from the Australian Sports Commission to become self-funded
• A refocus of the Sports Foundation’s mission: to raise money for the development of sport
• Bringing the Sports Foundation in line with the needs of sport today
• The change in motivations for why people give to sport – cultural, community, health, economic and emotional benefits

“It’s good to help and it’s good to give back to our community. Individuals and companies who donate are enabling local sports organisations to thrive and prosper and grow their participation numbers, which impacts our health and wellbeing nationally – that’s a real motivator to give,” says Sandra.

Tapping into Business Support

In the 2016-17 financial year more than $10 million in corporate donations was received by the Sports Foundation, including $134,000 in workplace giving donations.

As a fairly small contributor to their overall income the Sports Foundation sees workplace giving as a major growth opportunity.

“We’re certainly in the infancy stage of our workplace giving journey but so are most of our fundraising partners. We want to encourage them to do more of it – to tap into their supporters who could be giving through their workplace,” says Sandra.

“Traditionally sport has been a space where sponsorship has reigned supreme and workplace giving is new and different. As a sector we’re still unsure about it but we are having conversations to progress it as another donation type that will only grow over time.”

And there are definitely no plans to slow down the growth in donations to Australian sport any time soon.

“Our goal is to raise $100 million for Australian sport by 2021 – it’s big and ambitious but I have no doubt we can do it, particularly with the upcoming Commonwealth Games next year,” says Sandra.

If your company has Good2Give’s workplace giving program in place, you can donate to the Australian Sports Foundation while you work. If not, visit the charity’s website to support their terrific programs and initiatives.