Every since my first Tour de Cure ride for the ADA I’ve been on their mailing list. I can swear I had asked to be removed from it. With every letter, I felt that they were pushing the envelope when it came to asking me for more money, wasn’t it good enough that I raised money for them and participated in the Tour de Cure. Apparently not. They were wearing out their welcome, especially when I started getting phone calls from them. Ah, that’s it, the phone calls, I asked to be removed from the calling list and haven’t heard from the since (on the phone).
I got a letter the other day that expressed how little is put toward each diabetic in terms of research for treatments and cures. That amount they tell us is less than a nickel. And they sent me a nickel, very kind of them to add a coin to the great can of coins that I have growing, not to mention waste the money on postage to send me a letter that isn’t going anywhere but the shredder.
Last year I raised almost $2000 among the three Tour de Cures that I did. $750 of that came from me personally, not other people chipping in. I guess the real aggravation that comes from all this is that not only are they hitting me up for more money, they’re also hitting up the people that sponsored me. The people that sponsored me are getting the same letters, and they do the same thing, they see the envelope, say, “oh, ADA” and they chuck it.
This isn’t an effective use of the ADA’s funds, it’s a waste. This is how I think about it:
1) if I rode in a Tour de Cure once, I’m likely to do it again (which I have and I kindof plan on continuing)
2) if people supported me once, they’re likely to support me again (last year I had one family support me in all 3 of my rides out of the kindness of their hearts, I won’t personally hit up anyone more than once a year, but once a year of giving to the ADA is more than enough in my opinion)
Given my two theories, it’s a large waste of “fund raising” funds or whatever funds the ADA is spending on these mailings/calls to be seeking out additional funds from people that have participated/sponsored events in the past. It’s an even larger waste of money because they’re doing it more than once a year. I got several phone calls before I got fed up and said, stop calling me. I know that we got this same “Every nickel counts in the battle against diabetes” letter late last summer, and it’s only the beginning of the year, it’s not even been six months since we received the last one. What’s even worse, is that the nickels they send out, the nickels that don’t even cover a week’s worth of research for one American with diabetes, they’re being thrown away in most cases, many people don’t even open up the envelope, it just goes straight to the trash.
For an organization that is trying to tell people how every nickel can count, they don’t take care of their nickels too well.
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