Pictured above, from left to right: Rachel Peterson, Roberto Pinedo (guest speaker from PERUCAN-OH), and Tamara Peterson.

One of our goals for this Chapter Leader newsletter is to create a forum for chapter leaders to learn from each other and about each other. We’re calling this feature “A Rising Tide” because when one of our chapters succeeds, we all succeed – and we should share those strategies and successes with each other to lift all our boats, metaphorically speaking.  
 
This month, we’re featuring Rachel and Tamara Peterson, co-leaders of the OH, Hudson – 1 chapter. This mother-daughter duo have been leading their chapter for over 10 years! They also host an annual fundraiser for Together Women Rise and participate in various other community events with their chapter members.  Our Volunteer Manager, Kia Hunter, spoke with them about this year’s event and some best practices for hosting Rise fundraisers.

Tamara is an interior decorator, licensed realtor, and retired ICU nurse. In addition to her passion for Together Women Rise, she enjoys the outdoors, hiking, biking, and canoeing. Let’s just say, she stays busy! Rachel recently left her position as a marketing executive to pursue her passion as a novelist. She is currently writing a series of children’s books and has just received another deal with a publisher for a young adult novel. When not writing, Rachel is generally on horseback on her horse, Hope.

Kia: Can you tell us a little bit about how your chapter got started?

Tamara: Sometime in 2012 I was watching Brian Williams on the nightly news, and they did the “Friday Person of the Week” segment. They featured Marsha Wallace and Dining for Women. I was raised by a mom who worked two jobs and told me that women could do anything. I could do anything, be anything, and go anywhere. I think every woman and girl should have that ability. The Dining for Women mission really spoke to me and I spent the next six months researching the organization to make sure it was legitimate and matched my values. My daughter and I thought this would be a great way for us to give back and improve the lives of women and girls.

Rachel: I was living at home at the time, after graduating college and working my first job. My mom and I were looking for new activities and wanted to grow our relationship now that I was an adult. I also felt it was important not to lose sight of the larger world around me as I entered the work force. After all, I was raised by HER (Tamara) and was taught some of those amazing values and beliefs. It was natural for this mother-daughter dynamic to take place. We were already spending time with other mother-daughter duos and brought them all together for this purpose. It came together quite nicely.

Kia: When was the first time you held a fundraiser?

Tamara: We went to the Dining for Women 10th anniversary celebration in Greenville, SC in 2013. There were maybe 125 people there. A chapter from Philadelphia gave a presentation about fundraisers. There was a lot of wealth in that community, and they were able to raise like $25,000 at their events! I looked at Rachel and said, “why don’t we try doing it?” We knew that it didn’t matter how much we raised, but maybe we could get a couple hundred dollars to support this mission. We held our first event at our home and had a pasta dinner. We did everything ourselves; there was a lot of pasta and sauces produced! We had about 40 people and felt like it went really well. We had only been a chapter for about two years and were not well known in the community. Now we march in local parades, set up a booth at the farmers market, vendors know us and people donate goods and funds. We have even been invited for the second year in a row to volunteer at the community ice cream social, which is a major event in our town of 25,000 people. This has allowed us to also grow our chapter.

Kia: What have you learned after all these years? How has the process of hosting fundraisers evolved?

Tamara: First of all, if you’re going to plan a fundraiser you need to have some kind of event planning experience or know someone who can help. I am good at that, I have done it a lot, so it was an easier transition. You need a budget – know the costs of a venue, caterer, incidentals, renting plates, etc. We like to include a fun activity, and that can have a cost as well. Make sure that you’re not eating several hundred dollars because you underestimated the costs!

Rachel: We also learned to involve our chapter members very early on. Now our members expect it. Six months in advance we plan the date, ask members to take on different roles to procure decor, tech, entertainment, and PR to get your event in the local paper. We also have a raffle every year, so our members make those baskets.

This also allows every chapter member to shine in their particular interest. Everyone gets the opportunity to use their talents.

Another important question is “who knows somebody?” Generally someone will know someone who can help with a piece of the event that you can’t do yourself. It’s important to go to local vendors. It can be scary to walk in and ask a place of business to donate stuff but getting comfortable doing that is so important. Start small with that, go with local places that you have relationships. After 10 years, we have only been told “no” once!

Tamara: We always take brochures from Home Office to give them, we also have little name tags with the Rise logo and business cards printed up because then you look like you have a purpose, know what you are doing, and that you are valid. The venue where we hosted our daughter’s wedding reception gave us their space for free one year. Other places, we’ve been able to get it at just the cost of the cleaning fee. Going back to places you have patronized, that helps too. Bonus points for venues that are women owned!

Kia: Tell us more about this year’s event.

Rachel: This year’s event was called “Empowerment in Bloom.” We always host our fundraiser in the spring, so we usually pick a floral theme. We had 44 people. Quite a few current members come, and their spouses or significant others. One member brought her parents, who actually requested to come because they enjoyed it so much last year! Another member’s 14-year-old daughter wanted to attend as well, so we welcomed her. I would say it’s about 80% current members and immediately family and then 20% new people. We always play the video of the Featured Grantee of the month, so this year it was Sacred Valley Health. Because that grantee is based in Peru, we wanted to incorporate Peruvian culture into our event.

During our planning, we found out through internet searches that there is a Peruvian Society nearby, the Peruvian Cultural Association of Northeast Ohio (PERUCAN-OH), so we reached out to them to participate. They had a board member, Roberto Pinedo, who was interested in speaking with us and he was a hit at the event. He brought these beautiful posters, talked about the Peruvian culture and shared upcoming events in the community. It was a great way to connect what we are doing with our grantees with our local community. We also enjoyed hearing his personal immigration story and his experiences with the indigenous people of Peru. We raised over $2,000 this year, thanks in large part to a donor who matched up to $1,000 of our raffle. This donor couldn’t even attend the event, but they supported what we were doing and wanted to get involved. This also provided an incentive for people to buy more raffle tickets! If anyone wants help in planning a fundraiser, my mom and I would be happy to help.

A closeup of a quilt handmade by the OH, Hudson – 1 chapter which featured past Rise grantees.

Kia: What’s next?

Tamara: We would like to continue growing the event, have about 60 people. Incremental growth is key. We have also been fortunate that our membership continues to grow and it’s both young and old. One member has a 12-year-old daughter she brings to meetings. Now that young girl marches with us and she’s going to help with the ice cream social this year. We love having multigenerational chapter members. Together Women Rise makes us much better global citizens. We are all connected through this global economy and Rise allows us to broaden our horizons and make things better for women and girls.

If you are interested in being featured on “A Rising Tide” or have a recommendation for a chapter or chapter leader who should be featured, please email Kia Hunter, our Volunteer Manager, at volunteer@togetherwomenrise.org.