Runway for Recovery Surpasses Fundraising Goal by $25,000 with Classy Live
Mission
To redefine the experience for those diagnosed with breast cancer and to uplift and support the community that’s impacted by the disease
Challenge
Scaling Runway for Recovery’s annual event to meet growing demand
Solution
With Classy Live, Runway for Recovery brought supporters together in person and virtually. The organization customized their event page to include a fundraising thermometer, silent auction bids, and much more to make the one-hour runway show as impactful as possible
“With the national expansion that we have in mind, we’re happy to already have a fundraising software that can meet our growing needs.”
– Olivia Achtmeyer Boger, Founder
The Results With Classy Live:
$2.2M
gross donations since using Classy
127%
YoY revenue growth from 2021 to 2022
$25,000
raised over the fundraising goal
After her own mother passed away from breast cancer when she was 20 years old, Olivia Achtmeyer Boger, founder of Runway for Recovery, wanted a way to celebrate her mother’s memory while helping others for whom the cure would not come in time.
From a One-time Fashion Show to a Full-time Employee
Back in October 2007, Olivia was working full-time as an English teacher. In honor of the anniversary of her mother’s passing (which happened to coincide with Breast Cancer Awareness Month), Olivia invited everyone she knew to a one-time fashion show featuring models impacted by breast cancer. All proceeds raised went to support kids whose parents had passed from the disease.
At their inaugural runway show, together with 75 supporters and 10 models, they raised $13,000. Olivia thought that was it.
However, the models were begging to participate again, so Olivia started preparing for next year’s show. Soon it became an annual event. Every year, it got bigger and bigger with more supporters, more models, more money raised.
Some of the kids started off on the runway as three-year-olds, then became thirteen-year-olds, then college kids.
It became clear that the growth they were seeing was substantial. Olivia’s choice was to either retire the event or to take it on full-time. So 13 years after its inception, Olivia became the first full-time employee of Runway for Recovery.
Growing the Runway Experience with Classy Live
As a one-woman show, the next challenge was to maximize her flagship event and fundraising strategies. Olivia needed a fundraising tool that integrated with Salesforce, could connect to her email marketing tool, and support her growing events’ agenda. She needed to save time so that she could raise more and help more people. When she found Classy, it had everything she needed.
The 2021 runway show was a hybrid event, meaning supporters could join at the in-person event space in Boston, MA, or online from anywhere in the world. Over 1,300 supporters watched in real-time from 13 countries.
In 2022, with the help of Classy’s event software, Classy Live, the runway show’s fundraising goals were surpassed. Supporters were blown away by the experience. The Runway for Recovery team was able to customize the Classy Live page to include model interviews and stories, live chat, fundraising thermometer, silent auction bids, and more to make the one-hour runway show as impactful as possible.
Runway for Recovery raised $375,000 at 2022’s runway show alone, surpassing their annual fundraising goal of $350,000.
Expanding the Runway Mission Across the Country
Because of the success that Runway for Recovery has seen, it has grown from a once-a-year runway show on the East Coast to piloting a runway show on the West Coast, as well as hosting a model retreat, a picnic for the families funded through the Family Grant program, and monthly community events like yoga, HIIT, and meditation classes.
Next year, Runway for Recovery plans to surpass its annual fundraising goal and is aiming high at $1.1M after raising $786,609 in 2021.
While there are a lot of details that Olivia and her team need to take into consideration when expanding across the country, she feels confident knowing that fundraising is taken care of with Classy.
