Girl Scout cookie cocktail? Nonprofits get creative to raise money in the pandemic
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Girl Scouts and other nonprofits across Miami-Dade are going virtual with creative alternatives to traditional fundraisers.
To many people, Girl Scouts are virtually synonymous with cookies: Their massive annual bake sale helps sustain thousands of troops around the country.
But when the COVID-19 pandemic struck, that reliance on the well-loved cookies posed both a problem and an opportunity for Girl Scouts of Tropical Florida, the local council for Miami-Dade and Monroe counties.
For safety, national leaders banned the traditional door-todoor sales by Girl Scouts. Workplace sales were down also, with so many people out of the office for the foreseeable future. And the fundraising
luncheon that had generated tens of thousands in 2019 for the Tropical Florida chapter was now out of the question, said CEO Chelsea Wilkerson.
So what could they do instead to raise the badly needed dollars?
Their conundrum was hardly unique. Across South Florida, scores of nonprofit organizations that provide critical services, educational opportunities and cultural performances or exhibitions have been forced by the pandemic to forgo and totally retool the traditional galas and other fundraising events they have long depended on to help fund operations.
And like so many others, including the New World Symphony, the Pérez Art Museum Miami and the United Way of MiamiDade, the local Girl Scouts council had to go virtual, get inspired — and, yes, think outside of the box of cookies.
Many nonprofits are banking on a twist on the tried-and-true formula of dining or sampling wines, craft beer or cocktails at big gatherings — while, not incidentally, also providing a fun, virtual chance at reconnection for supporters who have been living in varying degrees of social isolation.
The GIrl Scouts recruited Miami star chef Adrianne Calvo to create a cocktail to pair with a signature Girl Scout cookie — the caramel-andcoconut Samoas — and offer a virtual mixology lesson that ticket buyers could follow remotely, using an appealing box of ingredients and other goodies delivered to them at home. Tickets started at $100.
It worked even better than council leaders had hoped. The Campfires to Cocktails event in November and the sweet, Samoainspired Old Fashioned cocktail Calvo concocted attracted around 400 people, some of them serving as virtual “table hosts” to online or small in-person groups. It raised more than $100,000, not only exceeding the goal for the fundraiser but the total raised by the 2019 luncheon, Wilkerson said.
“It was very, very well received.,” she said. “Everyone was able to do what they felt comfortable with. We wanted to bring something actually physical that people could touch and feel and connect with. It was a really lively group and a great event.”
The ongoing cookie sales have migrated online, too. Cookies can be ordered on the Tropical Florida council’s web page through Feb. 28 for delivery by Grub Hub or, in some cases, by the closest troop. (The cookies are also available at Girl
Scouts cookie booths at Publix, Winn-Dixie and Milam’s supermarkets.)
At New World Symphony, the training orchestra for young conservatory graduates that’s among the flushest nonprofits in Miami, the annual gala on Feb. 20 is also going online-only — though the centerpiece of the program, a new halfhour film, also will stream free to the general public that night at 7 p.m. It features performance clips and interviews with luminaries from the institution’s 34-year history, including architect Frank Gehry, who designed New
World’s signature home on South Beach.
Along with catered meals by Thierry Isambert Culinary and Event Design and a virtual cocktail party, New World gala patrons will get private streamed performances by classical superstars like cellist Yo-Yo Ma and clarinetist Anthony McGill and, for the higher level donors, interactive online talks with the performers. Contribution levels range from $1,000 to $100,000.
The event already “blew past” its fundraising goal of $1.25 million and is now at $1.5 million, said gala co-chair Judith Rodin, a New World trustee.
But instead of buying tables, donors are being asked to sponsor “principles” very much tied to the pandemic and broader social concerns, Rodin said.
All proceeds from the gala will go to a new Resilience Fund at New World that will help it cope with and emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on its music fellows and the institution, while supporting the orchestra’s efforts to bolster inclusiveness, diversity and equity in its programs.
The fund, launched with a $500,000 donation from Rodin and her husband and gala co-chair, Paul Verkuil, will provide COVID-19 testing and mental health services to orchestra fellows as well as seed capital for webcasting New World performances.
It will also help broaden the symphony’s audience by creating a portable version of its hugely popular Wallcasts, in which live performances are shown for free on the facade of its building. The mobile Wallcast will bring New World performances and classical music to neighborhoods across South Florida and Miami.
“At first we thought it was going to be very hard to raise money. But it seems we’re inspiring people through this notion of capacity building,” said Rodin, former president of the University of Pennsylvania and the Rockefeller Foundation, and author of a book on resiliency. “We were not only suffering from a pandemic in the past year, but also responding to issues of social and racial injustice.
“The struggles that people are experiencing because of the pandemic made me understand that crisis is becoming the new normal. The idea was to use New World Symphony as potentially a teaching tool for other arts institutions, on how to rebound from a crisis and transform and grow, and not just return to normal.
“I think what’s happening in this COVID moment highlights those needs, and thus the urgency of the ask is very evident. This the good side of America, I think.”
The Pérez Art Museum Miami’s annual fundraiser to benefit its African American Art Fund has become a hot ticket since its inception eight years ago — and 2021’s virtual-by-necessity edition on Feb. 6 is following that trend, thanks also in part to the chance to sample the work of a celebrity chef at home.
Tickets for a homedelivered meal for two or for six people by renowned chef Marcus Samuelsson, owner of Overtown’s new Red Rooster, have sold out at $1,000 and $5,000. Also sold out is a “celebration bag” containing gifts from local Black-owned businesses and event sponsors.
Tickets to view the online event, at $75, are still available. That includes a conversation between Samuelsson and PAMM director Franklin Sirmans, a reveal of several new works by Black artists acquired by the museum through the fund, and a set by popular Miamibased DJ Pam Jones, who also spun live at the 2020 pre-pandemic event.
What that means, a happy Sirmans said, is that the museum will easily meet its $400,000 goal for the Art + Soul event — something organizers could not have guaranteed when planning it. But it helped that the museum gained valuable experience hosting online talks and events while shut down for months by a county lockdown order.
“It’s a new, new, new undertaking,” Sirmans said of the fundraiser.
“But it’s a lot of what we’ve been doing during this time, and it’s been successful. We’ve had some live events, learned a lot and have some sense of what we can do.”
Initially, museum leaders had assumed that by now they could hold a “hybrid” fundraiser combining in-person and athome participation, but the unflagging pandemic made that a tall order, Sirmans said.
But going online ended up drawing ticket buyers from across the country who in other years likely would not have made a trip to Miami for the event, including supporters from Los Angeles, Chicago and Atlanta, he noted.
“With an event like Art and Soul that already has a national profile, this year has allowed for some people who were never going to make it to Miami to be part of this celebration,” Sirmans said. “It has definitely been a way of broadening participation.”
The museum is now planning its annual gala in April, and that event, Sirmans hopes, will be a hybrid, though details are still being nailed down.
One of the most wideranging nonprofit fundraisers locally, the United Way of Miami-Dade, supports dozens of groups serving some of the neediest county residents. It, too, is unveiling a hybrid format as it unrolls three Spring events centered around food and wine.
All three Spring events provide a to-go version of the agency’s long-running Veritage Miami series; limited numbers of supporters will be able to participate in person if they choose, said United Way chief communications officer Cristina Blanco.
“These events are usually very large,” Blanco said. “What’s different this year is that we will allow private watch parties because a lot of people are not ready to come out. We are catering to people who want to have quarantinebubble parties.”
The first, on April 11, is an interactive farm-to-fork brunch with three Miami chefs, including Michael Schwartz. A May 13 event pairs craft beers and bar bites by local brewers and food artisans.
The headline event the next evening features an interactive dinner with chef Calvo. For those staying home, meal ingredients, wine and recipe cards will be delivered for groups up to eight. Participants can cook on a livestream along with Calvo.
A relatively small cohort, well under half the usual crowd of around 700, will dine in person while socially spread out at the Intercontinental Hotel in downtown Miami, the usual venue for the annual fundraiser, Blanco said. Donation levels start at $85 for the craft beer tasting to $7,000 for a table for eight at the Calvo dinner.
The Spring events are modeled on Back of the House, a new virtual format the United Way debuted in September. It featured a three-course dinner, a wine-tasting and a holiday mixology class, Blanco said.
Like PAMM and the Girl Scouts, the United Way has found that the online alternatives have brought in some new faces. And that means that some interactive elements are certain to be a supplemental option even after fundraisers go back to mostly in-person participation. That may be especially true if the novel coronavirus remains a concern for years to come, as some experts are now saying.
While virtual events can’t replace the in-person socializing, Blanco said, many people seem to like having the choice to stay home.
“Now that people have experienced these types of events and we know it can be done, they have some advantages,” Blanco said. “What we heard from some people was, ‘I didn’t have to get dressed up.’
Or, ‘I was comfortable at home.’ So I think there will be elements of this for some time to come.”