80% Won’t Be Back Next Year

Why the Finish Line of Your Fundraising Walk or 5K Should Be the Starting Line of a Monthly Giving Movement

You did it!!

After months of planning, recruiting, coordinating, marketing, troubleshooting, and good weather, your event was a success. Sponsors committed. Volunteers showed up, phew! Teams gathered in matching shirts. Stories were shared. Milestones were celebrated. And when participants crossed the finish line, there was pride, emotion, and a visible reminder of why your mission matters. Why they care. Why they showed up.

Your one-day event worked after MONTHS of effort.

But here’s the reality most organizations don’t plan around: roughly 80–85% of participants won’t return next year. Not because they didn’t care or the experience wasn’t meaningful. Life simply moves forward. They walked away. Calendars fill. Priorities shift. And most of your hard-earned momentum quietly fades.

And that’s where the real opportunity lives…the next step after the finish line.

A fundraising walk or 5K is never just a Saturday morning. It represents months of sponsor outreach, peer-to-peer activation, email campaigns, storytelling, and operational precision. You didn’t just host an event — you built attention, trust, and an emotional connection. You gathered people who care enough to show up, give, and they invited others into your mission.

That’s a powerful community.

Yet for many nonprofits, the finish line becomes the end. The recap email goes out. The final total is announced. The tents come down. And over the next few weeks, participants, sponsors, and fundraisers disconnect. Your community and relationship opportunity is all but dormant. Then, a few months later, the event rebuilding begins. 

The cost of the 80-85% isn’t registration revenue, it’s momentum.

What if the event was the most important starting line for lifetime value? Immediately after your event, participants are at their emotional peak. They feel proud of what they accomplished. They feel connected to others. They feel inspired by the impact. That moment is when engagement is strongest and trust is highest.

Instead of saying, “See you next year,” imagine saying: “Keep walking with us, every month.”

This is your shift from an event to a relationship with lifetime value.

Rather than treating your event as a once-a-year revenue spike, you transform it into a habit-based monthly giving community. A one-time registration or donation becomes a manageable recurring commitment — $10, $15, or $20 per month. It feels accessible. It feels purposeful. It feels like continued participation, not another fundraising ask.

They’re not just donating. They’re walking, staying healthy, supporting the mission and sharing monthly with peers. And unlike event-day revenue, it doesn’t depend on weather, turnout, or venue capacity. It depends on relationships — and relationships compound.

Sponsors benefit from this shift as well. Traditional sponsorship delivers valuable but short-lived visibility: a banner, a logo on a shirt, a podium mention, goodie bags. Today’s sponsors increasingly want ongoing alignment, measurable impact, and sustained brand presence. By integrating a monthly giving pathway, sponsors can extend their engagement beyond race day, support matched gifts, and remain visible within an active community throughout the year.

Instead of sponsoring a moment, they fuel your movement.

Peer-to-peer fundraisers gain a natural evolution too. They invested time sharing personal stories, inviting donations, building teams, and activating networks. Without a continuation strategy, that social capital disappears. With a monthly pathway in place, those networks can transition into ongoing supporters, without campaign burnout. 

The event becomes the beginning — not the peak.

The organizations that build long-term stability aren’t simply focused on increasing event attendance next year. They focus on retaining monthly engagement with lifetime value. They understand that one-day momentum is powerful, but sustained commitment is transformative.

Your walk or 5K already proved something important: people care enough to show up.

The real strategic question isn’t how to get them back next year. It’s how to keep walking with them every day. 

Because the most important step in your fundraising event isn’t across the finish line.

It’s the steps that follow.