Gotta have a program. May not be perfect, that' s okay, but it should cover 99% of the planned activities, and in order.

5 people to run a good banquet is tough. Consider hiring out some of the work. For example, we hire a group of women (an organization called Women of Today) to sell the raffle tickets at the event, pay them a %-age of what they raise. [In the wayback days, DU would hire scantily clad femmes to sell.] I assume you ask local merchants for raffle prize donations. Consider hiring (i.e. paying) someone to do this--tricky, need a reliable self-starter with no regular, full-time job, a natural-born salesperson, who is aggressive and committed, as well as innovative. I' d look to a parttime Chamber of Commerce type. You can also run a preliminary solicitation to the merchants with a computer-generated letter of introduction/solicitation.

Divide up the work in logical phases. We have certain members who do the same thing each year--two guys always do the tickets, one guy always buys the guns, one guy always runs the penny pot, etc. I' d say that we have 15 guys who do the planning, 5-10 guys who do most of the actual prebanquet work, and 25-30 guys, plus 10-15 kids, who actually " run" the banquet. The day before the banquet everyone shows up to help set up, and that DOES take some time, usually 4-6 hours for 20-30 guys. Some of the banquet " jobs" are relatively short--the guy who runs the penny pot, e.g., is usually done within an hour, and then is free to do as he wishes. You can put a couple of guys in charge of the silent auction. Really no work, just they' re " in charge."

Use a professional auctioneer.

Start the program with a nondenominational prayer.

Rehearse the event in your mind. How do we get the prizes to the winners? How do you collect tickets, sell more tickets, when does the speaker speak, when is the live auction, when do the silent auctions close?

Have an emcee--if not a chapter member, then maybe the auctioneer, but usually the auctioneers we use just show up to do their thing, so they don' t like to run the whole show, and aren' t familiar with the whole show.

I should go into the banquet/fundraising consulting business. [