DebConf/DebConf/Fundraising
Fundraising is what keeps Debian Conferences happening year after year. The idea of Debconf is also to have an event that pays for itself by way of Sponsorship, Corporate Attendance fees, Debian Store selling merchandise etc., the bulk of receipts come though from Sponsorship by various Companies who have a vested interest in seeing Debian grow.
Initial Fundraising is started around October itself by pinging people who have been part of older Debian Conferences. This is usually done initiated by somebody from the local organising team who will take the lead as well as people in Debian who have contacts with the wider Debian, FOSS community and Industry.
There are usually 3-4 tiers of sponsorship and the amount is inline or maybe a bit more depending upon local and global factors, inflation etc. The Sponsorship tiers are discussed between the local organizing team and the Debian committee before sponsorship e-mails are sent out.
The fund-raising team could be one or more people but people should be clear of the responsibilities. First a brochure is prepared which details the various tiers and the benefits entitled with that tier.
It is always better that the person who best knows the company to ask sponsorship. This raises chances of getting sponsorship. It is advisable to hold of a month or more before sending a second mail if needed to remind the company of the benefits to be associated as a sponsor of Debconf.
One thing to note is that depending upon where the company is registered, it may redirect to a local branch which would need following up. Another thing which needs to be kept in mind is Companies usually have some budgets for sponsoring Events every year, so if possible right at the beginning of the fiscal/financial year when they have the budget. Depending upon regional or local customs, the financial year may be either at the end of year or end of March or what is in that particular country. There is a wikipedia which shows the subtle differences in many countries. For instance, India has been considering to have the financial year moved to end of year in accordance to the Gregorian Calendar.
If a company shows interest in sponsoring Debconf at whatever level, that needs to be followed up. If the reply is positive than an invoice is generated which is sent to the sponsor giving details about the organization which has been authorized to accept sponsorship money on behalf of Debian. This is usually done by one or more organizations which are listed as trusted organizations by Debian. Also see the donations page to know how that works as well. The trusted organizations are authorized both to accept donations and make payments on behalf of Debian.
Once an invoice is sent, confirmation received that the invoice was received by the sponsor organization, ask them till when the amount can be received. On some tiers of sponsorship, Debian also allows sponsor organizations the option to have some sort of hardware or trinket/souvenir so attendees remember the sponsor as well as Debconf s(he) was part of.
If the sponsor is part of the tier than a deadline needs to be planned beforehand so that the sponsor has enough time for the packing, shipping, taking delivery, unpacking, loading into registration bags can be done with time to spare .
Some sponsors may also send attendees who may also submit talks about the companies contributions to Debian which would be graded by the content-team . If it passes that then they may also want to have couple of conference bags for the companies to take back (may depend upon sponsorship tier as well as conference bags with goods availability), so those needs to be kept in mind as well. But this part is usually handled by FrontDesk,
