AddRPM
Easily generate funds for the causes you care about while simply going about your business.
“With RPM’s support, we funded and launched (and are now maintaining) a charitable fund. I still can’t believe I can say that! It’s given every show I play more meaning.” — Merrill Garbus, Tune-Yards
Questions about addRPM?
Jessica George, Executive Director
[email protected]
AddRPM helps accelerate your philanthropy through mechanisms already embedded within your day-to-day work.
This means that you can easily generate tens of thousand and even millions of new funds for charities while simply going about your business.
Donations from artists send a powerful message–as the Executive Director of a beneficiary organization said,
“This donation is more energizing to our movement than much bigger donations because of who it came from!”
RPM helps artists have a bigger philanthropic impact with a lot less effort. Towards this end, we’ve developed a number of different streamlined strategies. RPM can advise on or implement on any of these:
- Ticket Add-ons: Adding micro-donations to every ticket you sell is the easiest and quickest way to raise significant funds. And, if ticket add-ons become the industry standard, we’ll collectively raise more than $40 million per year.
- Auctions & Raffles: Tickets, VIP experiences, and gear can be auctioned for charity simply and effectively. And the impact is immense–one artist’s tour raised $270,000 auctioning just 4 pairs of VIP tickets per show! Another raised over $100,000 in just 3 days by raffling a pair of tickets to a private show.
- Fan Donation Campaigns: Fans want to support the organizations that artists care about. These fan donation campaigns are quick to implement, and especially effective as a response to disasters, issues, or in tandem with other fundraising efforts like corporate matches. You can embed a donation as an option in your ticket sales via most platforms (including Ticketmaster), use a stand-alone fundraising platform, or a simple donate button.
- Merchandise Campaigns: Cause-related products, like a branded stainless steel water bottle and tote bags, don’t just lead to donations to related organizations, but they raise awareness and can help encourage small behaviors that add up to big change. Add-ons can also be applied to merchandise.
- Charitable VIP Packages: Once-in-a-lifetime, backstage and VIP experiences at concerts can be very successful fundraisers. A portion or all of the proceeds can be charitable.
- Guest List Donations: Festivals and tours can not only raise significant funds, but engage comp’ed guests by requesting or requiring a donation. This raises funds and builds a culture of philanthropy in the industry.
- Licensing: Some artists have licensed their songs/recordings to brands in exchange for higher than normal licensing fees donated to charities on their behalf.
Each of these strategies can stand alone or be done together. RPM can help you decide and even implement.
HIGHLIGHT: Ticket Add-ons
Adding micro-donations to every ticket you sell is the easiest and quickest way to raise significant funds. These micro-donations—from $.50 to $3 added to every ticket—make it practically effortless to support the causes you care about. And the potential is immense—if a $1 ticket add-on becomes the industry standard, together we can raise $40 million every year!
“What’s great about a liaison like [Revolutions Per Minute] is that they know what is needed in each area [so] we can be more effective with our philanthropy.” — Patrick Hallahan, My Morning Jacket
Ticket add-ons are really, really simple. Artists and managers make just two decisions:
- How much? Contact RPM when a tour is routed, before it’s confirmed or contracted. We help you decide how much to add-on and provide deal memo language.
- To whom? We see the greatest results when tours benefit two to four organizations addressing one specific issue holistically—including those providing individual direct service and those working toward systemic change. We’ll discuss our pre-vetted list of organizations with you, or research others that you are interested in.
One step per team member.
- Agents: Receive a “how-to” document from RPM that includes deal memo language for promoters.
- Promoters: Cut check to RPM at settlement, per deal memos and “how-to” document.
- Tour managers: Ensure that promoters cut checks as specified in deal memos.
- Publicists: Ensure legal compliance by implementing a customized version of RPM’s recommended language for ticket buyers.
- No steps for business managers or accountants. Raised funds do not hit the artist’s account. No tax implications. No separate accounting.
Add-ons are effective.
- Meaningful results. Giving to two to four organizations working on one main issue in slightly different ways means you will contribute holistically to an issue you care about, effecting significant and lasting change.
- Significant donations. A $1 ticket add-on at a venue like Red Rocks could lead to a $10,000 donation! And there’s no minimum or maximum number of shows; start with a few bigger shows, hometown shows, pre-sales, or a full tour.
- Fan engagement. Add-ons can be publicized during every step of the process. Some artists even invite fans to vote on the beneficiary causes or to help spread the word about causes.
The Impact:
- A five minute conversation with the Beastie Boys resulted in $750,000 donated to causes they cared about.
