Holding a Big Bake at work is a fantastic way to raise dough to support families affected by a brain tumour and improve morale at your workplace. After all, who doesn’t love cake? To help you get ready to crumble, here are our top 10 tips for hosting a workplace bake sale.
1. Ask for permission first!
Some workplaces are strict about what fundraising activities you can do on-site. So it’s important that you ask for permission from your manager to hold your Big Bake. The last thing we want is for you to get in trouble.
Once you do have permission, you’ll want to agree a date and time for your event. Remember, if everybody works from home on a Friday, it’s probably not a good idea to hold your event at the end of the week.
However, it’s different if your Big Bake is also open to your customers. Then the weekend might be a good choice if that’s when you have the most people visiting.
2. Ask your colleagues for a hand
If your workplace is anything like our HQ, you’ll have no shortage of people who are happy to contribute some form of tasty treat to your Big Bake.
We recommend that you use a sign-up sheet for bakers who are helping out. This helps you know how much food will be available and helps avoid everyone contributing the same thing. Obviously there’s no such thing as too much cake! But having a wide variety of food available is better than just having a plethora of pecan pies.
3. Spread the word about your Big Bake
Every workplace handles communication differently, from apps like Slack or Teams to simply using email or an intranet. However you normally chat to colleagues, make sure you use that forum to talk about your upcoming Big Bake.
If you have a colleague dedicated to internal communications, they might be able to help you spread the word about your event. They might also have some advice about how best to include remote staff in your workplace bake sale.
Make sure you check out our downloadable resources for The Big Bake 2023. We’ve got everything from invitations and posters to cake labels and social media assets.
4. Throw in a bit of healthy competition
A great way to stir up interest in your Big Bake is by holding a workplace Bake Off. You can even have prizes for the winners! Anything from our range of The Brain Tumour Charity baking merchandise would be perfect. Don’t forget that if your Big Bake raises more than £350, we’ll send you a free oven glove and if you raise over £500, we’ll send you an oven glove and an apron!
A workplace Bake Off doesn’t need to be too complicated. All you need to do is ask people to vote for their favourite bake or give each bake they try a rating out of 10.
You could also whip up excitement by holding other activities like a sweepstakes, raffle or guess the weight of the cake competition.
5. Have fun but stay safe!
Anything that’s dairy-free, gluten-free or could contain nuts should kept separate from all other baked goods and they should be clearly labelled. You should also label anything that caters to a specific diet, for example halal, vegan or vegetarian bakes.
Wash your hands regularly before setting up your Big Bake and during the event. Make sure you’ve got lots of tongs and cake slicers available so that you don’t need to touch the food with your hands at all.
6. Ask your employer to match the funds you raise at your workplace bake sale
Some companies will actually match the funds raised for charity by their employees. It certainly doesn’t hurt to ask and you can even download a matched funding form from our website if you’re unsure how to record this information.
7. Stock up on supplies
You’ll need more than just great cakes to host a brilliant Big Bake. You’ll want to make sure you’ve stocked up on essentials like napkins, takeaway cake boxes and crockery.
Running out of supplies in the middle of your event can really derail a Big Bake, so making sure you have a list of everything you need and stocking up on them is a great choice.
8. Decide on payment options in advance
Handling cash can be one of the most stressful elements of holding your Big Bake at work – especially if you’re the only one taking donations. As well as the hygiene concerns that come with handling cash, there’s always the fear that you’ll run out of change!
One way to avoid this, is to opt for a cashless Big Bake. It’s easier than ever to go for this option by setting up a JustGIving page and having people donate to that in exchange for some baked goods.
Any donations you receive are sent to us automatically, so you don’t need to worry about sending us anything after the event. Plus, JustGiving also makes it really easy to thank everybody who donated and update them after the event.
You can even create a personalised QR code so that people can donate using their phone’s camera. All you need to do is go to your JustGiving page and add “/qrcode” to the end of the URL and hit enter. Your QR code will appear for you download by right-clicking the image and saving it your device.
For example, our fundraising page is justgiving.com/thebraintumourcharity. So we’d add /qrcode to the end to make justgiving.com/thebraintumourcharity/qrcode.
You can then print this out and have it available at your Big Bake to make it easier for your guests to donate.
9. Say “cheese (cake)”
We adore seeing photos from your of events, so make sure you post lots of pictures online and use #BigBake2023.
And don’t worry about making sure your cakes look perfect. We love seeing your soggy bottoms, wonky Welshcakes and crumbly cookies.
10. Clean up after your workplace bake sale
We’re confident that you’ll have very little leftover cake to pack away after your event, but it’s important to remember to clean up after yourself.
If you do have a little bit of food leftover, we recommend researching local food banks or donations centres in advance so you can make sure your leftovers don’t go to waste.
Are you ready to crumble?
Have we inspired you to don your apron, raise up your rolling pin and get baking for a cure?
Sign up to host a Big Bake this September and join our mouth-watering movement for change.