Every winter, hundreds of business leaders gather in Australia’s capital cities to collect funds to fight homelessness on behalf of Vinnies. The annual CEO Sleepout has not only become a successful fundraiser for a very worthy cause, but it is also a media event that raises awareness and highlights the plight of the many homeless in our community. This year alone, more than 7 million Dollars were raised and one leader from one of our AHK member organisations played her part in it.
Birgit Goetz is the CEO of Martin Luther Homes, a not-for-profit organisation that provides retirement and aged care services to people in Melbourne’s outer east. After hearing about the value of the event from fellow CEOs, the German-born business leader decided to take part, raise funds, and not shy away from a cold night out that marks the peak of the fundraising event.
The idea behind the CEO SleepOut is that business leaders activate their professional and private networks to motivate as many people and organisations as possible to contribute, no matter how big or small the donation.
Martin Luther Homes has more than 100 permanent residents in its aged care centre and more than 40 people live in its retirement village. There are also close to 150 staff and many more contractors and volunteers. Birgit, who is also the President of the Australian-German Welfare Society, then communicated the idea behind the fundraiser to the people in her organisations and, without much delay, the first donations started coming in.
However, one major challenge was the fact that all the donations are collected via credit card payments on Birgit’s profile page that was set-up for her by Vinnies. When taking into consideration that the majority of the residents at Martin Luther Homes are over 80 years of age and that many of them do not own a credit card nor have access to the internet, a solution was needed.
It came as no surprise, that the solution was presented to Brigit by the residents themselves. The committee in the retirement village decided to run a fundraiser for the fundraiser. Accordingly, one of the very popular Bingo sessions was turned into a fundraising event that was visited by many who wanted to make their contribution in person and cash.
The Bingo fundraiser turned out to be a success and many hundreds of dollars were collected in just one afternoon. The funds were then donated on behalf of the residents and many more donations followed.
On the big day, the 20th of June, Birgit wore the CEO SleepOut trademark beanie, while spending the night out in a cold carpark with other leaders from all walks of business. Once the numbers were crunched, it turned out that Birgit had raised 5,120 Dollars, equaling 16 individual support programs, 42 beds or 170 meals for people who are affected by homelessness.
On the chilly morning after, Birgit took the opportunity to thank all her supporters who have so generously donated and made her involvement in the Vinnies CEO SleepOut a success.
22.07.2019