Welcome to the Gala

While summer means a break from the ballroom, with the occasional foray under a massive tent to practice fancy panhandling for good causes, HUNT Auctioneers are actively preparing for the fall fundraising season. This means speaking and meeting with non-profit organizations to learn about what they do, and how they change lives.

The gala, whatever you may think of it, is an opportunity to for people to share their stories. As development consultants to non-profits great and small, we help organizations communicate their human impact by taking the time to understand the people they serve. And that means spending time with folks in shelters and hospitals, kids at camps, listening to men and women whose lives were positively impacted by the generosity of others.

One of our favorite events of the spring was for Services for the Underserved, an incredible organization that helps feed, shelter, employ and revitalize the lives of New York City’s homeless population. We were able to visit their midtown shelter Harmonia, and learn of the powerful transformations that occur there, how being treated with dignity and respect can completely alter a person’s perceptions of their own self worth.

Why do you do what you do, and whose lives would you impact if you could? And here’s the golden question, how can we help another human being today? There’s an intellectual paradox at work when you sit down to a filet mignon and champagne at a gala, but the money you paid for that ticket will go towards helping others eat.

A homeless man on the street once asked “Do you know what’s the greatest nation?” I reflexively thought of our own imperfect country. But he said “The DONATION!”