Enormous teddy

Elegran. Yours is a brilliant idea. Make sure grans and grandads too are welcome.

Love the idea of the Teddy Bears picnic, and the charge of £1 sound very good ...you could donate any profit to charity after providing cakes or sandwiches , tea and cold drinks ...lots of games for the little ones ....a little paddling pool with plastic ducks to catch (not too deep and supervised !) your local Mumsnet might have some input ......and ...was going to suggest a teddy bear prize for the most loved Teddy, but that might upset the losers ......or take him on a visit to a care home for dementia patients near you .......it might make the residents happy to bring back childhood memories of their loved Teddies ........

PS ....when I was about 25, I said to my dad how I would have loved a Teddy as a child .......ha ha next Christmas I was rewarded with a 5' teddy like yours .................he sat on a chair in the bedroom and moved with me everywhere I went, then my own daughter adopted him .............that was 40 years ago ............no idea where the daughter or the teddy are now but I do have a photo !!

It sounds like this teddy has enough potential to enjoy a whole day of fundraising.
Maybe you could have some kind of 'anti raffle', where people pay not to win him (or her, or them!)

Haha. I won a giant Andrex puppy at Christmas. It was so big the shop owner had to carry it to my car and push it into the back seat. Now I don't know what to do with it as the grandchildren are bored with it. Maybe I'll donate it to grandchild's school for a raffle. Thanks for the idea.

Oh Apricity, I didn’t want to be negative about people suggesting that the bear was donated to a good cause. I’ve volunteered in a hospice and a playgroup and the last thing we wanted in either was a giant teddy! We didn’t have the space and the hygiene questions around donated furry toys are a minefield.

At the hospice shop we had to pay for a fortnightly skip for the rubbish people dumped outside and we couldn’t sell and furry toys must have filled up a quarter of it every time!

Some very creative ideas here to try to do something constructive with such a dud donation. Why on earth do people buy this rubbish? The charity shops don't want them, families don't want them and they are environmental disasters ending up as non degradable landfill for the next umpteen thousand years.

I agree donating the bear to a good cause after you've used him/her for fundraising, hope he has the requisite safety labels (no-one will want bear without correct labels). Good luck with your fundraising.

My younger son once named a huge teddy correctly. I was horrified but the friend who donated it said she was delighted it was going to a good home - not for long I have to add.

Donate to the next charity bonfire.

We won a Teddy like that a few years ago and donated him to the local hospice. We did get some strange looks when driving him down, complete with seat belt?

How about people paying to attach their names onto the bear on small place card type cards which can be hooked on with jewellers earring hooks (Amazon pks of 100 £1.99)
You could pre-prepare the hooks on cards and have a small table with a pot of pens to write their own name with. Photos could be taken by local press with the bare bear and the bear covered with card names.

How about a Bear Hunt - with obstacles based on the book and the bear at the end hidden in a den? Again - big picnic - fee on the gate etc. We did something similar for our local primary school - lots of noise and, more importantly, cash raised

I think there’s some great ideas on here
In the charity shop we regularly get given HUGE soft toys which no one ever wants they rarely sell but take up massive space so we pass on to whoever will take them as fast as possible They really are a nightmare
I like the teddy bear picnic idea

There are people who would be delighted to win a giant teddy. Costco was selling them a while back and people presumably bought them.

Wow Elegran. Brilliant! Were you a professional fundraiser?

You could hold a "Teddybears Picnic" at a fund-raising event, with children bringing their teddybears for juice and biscuits at £1 each, presided over by your giant ted (wearing a floury apron?). Publicise it well in advance, so that they know to bring the teds, and maybe have someone taking photos of a child with the big ted and their own little one, tucking into the biscuits. You could take orders on the spot for prints (get the money and a contact number! People tend to completely forget that they said they wanted a copy and you are left with them)

My Californian DGC had a huge teddy which lived in a room with a large window. One morning there was a distinct bear paw print on the outside of the window and we decided a bear must have looked in attracted by the teddy. It was hidden each night after that and soon went to a charity shop.

50p to throw paint bombs at the teddy! Or water if you can’t be so ruthless.

I’m with Pamela.

Sorry kitty

Absolutely would be horrified to win that, no wonder someone gave it to you.
Why not just use it as a way to attract people to your stall and then give a smaller teddy as a prize? Then donate the big one to a playgroup(or similar)
As the moment we have a bright green blow up crocodile in the hall, 6ft. long. That’s enough for me. It is, thank goodness on its way to the shed.

I like Marydoll's idea. There could be a different prize eg bottle of wine and you could use the teddy again. Or donate him to a hospice.

In my school, we used to do, " Guess the teddy's birthday. ".
We used an old diary and people put their name and contact details against the date. Choose a date beforehand in front of a witness and put in a sealed envelope.

You could do a 'Guess the name' raffle type thingy, then donate the teddy afterwards.