How to run a prize draw for your zoo or wildlife park

by Rebecca Hughes | Jul 20, 2026 | Environment & sustainability, Learn, Stories

Prize draws are one of the most effective fundraising tools available to zoos and wildlife parks in the UK, yet still one of the most underused. They lower the barrier to entry for supporters, reach audiences far beyond your existing visitor base, and can be built around the thing you already have that no other charity does: direct access to extraordinary animals.

This guide covers everything you need to know to run a successful prize draw on Crowdfunder, from choosing your prize to promoting it and picking your winner.

Why prize draws work so well for zoos

Most fundraising asks require a supporter to give with nothing in return. A prize draw changes that equation. For £5 or £10, someone gets a chance to win something genuinely exciting; and your zoo gets a supporter, a new contact, and funds raised.

For zoos and wildlife parks specifically, the prize draw format has three particular advantages.

You have prizes no one else can offer. A behind-the-scenes experience with your keepers, a chance to feed an endangered animal, a private after-hours tour; these are money-can’t-buy prizes that no voucher or product giveaway can replicate. The exclusivity is the point.
Your cause resonates. Wildlife conservation, animal welfare, and habitat protection are causes people care deeply about. A prize draw that connects entry to a tangible conservation outcome, “every £5 entry helps fund our red panda breeding programme”, gives supporters a reason to enter beyond just winning.
You can run them repeatedly. Edinburgh Zoo ran twelve consecutive prize draws on Crowdfunder over several years, raising over £400,000 in total across those campaigns with 16,745 supporters. A well-run draw builds a list of engaged supporters you can return to again and again.

What makes a great zoo prize draw prize?

The prize is everything. A good zoo prize draw prize has three qualities: it’s exclusive, it’s experiential, and it’s connected to your animals or mission.

Behind-the-scenes experiences: Keeper-for-a-day, animal feeding sessions, private guided tours outside public hours; these are the gold standard for zoo prize draws. Edinburgh Zoo built an entire multi-year campaign around their Giant Panda Magic Moment, and Wild Planet Trust in Paignton ran a draw around an exclusive meet and greet with Mo, their sloth. The animal is the prize.
Once-in-a-lifetime encounters: The further the prize goes from what a normal visitor can access, the more compelling it becomes. WWF, Fauna & Flora and the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund ran a joint prize draw on Crowdfunder for a seven-day trip to Rwanda and Uganda to track mountain gorillas in the wild, with a £2,000 flights voucher included. That prize raised significant funds precisely because it was genuinely irreplaceable.
Multiple prizes to widen appeal: Edinburgh Zoo’s Christmas Magic Moment draw offered 12 winners a choice of animal encounter at either Edinburgh Zoo or Highland Wildlife Park. Multiple prizes lower the barrier further: better odds, more winners, more buzz when results are announced.
Partnerships and donated prizes: If your zoo has a relationship with a hotel, a travel company, or a wildlife tour operator, a donated prize partnership removes cost from your end entirely. Edinburgh Zoo partnered with the Waldorf Astoria Edinburgh for an overnight stay alongside their private zoo access prize. The hotel got visibility, the zoo got a world-class prize at no cost.

How to set up your prize draw on Crowdfunder

Setting up a prize draw on Crowdfunder is free and takes about 20 minutes. There are no platform fees for not-for-profit organisations.

What you’ll need before you start:

Your prize clearly defined (what it is, who it’s for, any age restrictions or access requirements)
A fundraising target and closing date
Terms and conditions for the draw (Crowdfunder provides a template)
A free entry route — this is a legal requirement (more on this below)

Step by step:

Go to crowdfunder.co.uk and create a project
Select prize draw as the project type
Describe your prize, your cause, and how the funds raised will be used
Set your entry price (£5 per entry is standard; you can allow multiple entries)
Set your closing date — a minimum of 14 days is required
Upload your terms and conditions
Publish and start promoting

The free entry route: what you need to know

Every prize draw on Crowdfunder must include a free entry route. This is a legal requirement under UK gambling law; without it, a prize draw can be classified as a lottery, which requires a licence.

A free entry route means anyone can enter without paying, typically by sending a postcard or email. The free entry route must be as accessible as the paid route, and free entrants must have the same chance of winning as paid entrants.

The free entry route must offer the same chance of winning as paid entry, be no harder to use, and be clearly signposted. Free entrants must be added to the pool of entries before you pick a winner.

Setting your entry price and target

Entry price: £5 per entry is the standard for most zoo prize draws and the format Edinburgh Zoo used consistently across their campaigns. A lower price point makes the draw accessible to families and maximises the number of entrants. You can allow multiple entries, which increases both revenue and individual supporter investment.

Fundraising target: Set a target based on the size of your audience and the appeal of your prize. A behind-the-scenes animal encounter with a moderate social following might target £1,000–£3,000. A high-profile partnership prize draw with a large email list can target significantly more. Edinburgh Zoo’s draws consistently raised tens of thousands across their monthly series.

All or nothing vs keep what you raise: If you choose all or nothing, you only receive funds if you hit your target, and all entries are refunded if you don’t. Keep what you raise means you receive everything pledged regardless. For prize draws, keep what you raise is often more appropriate; you’re awarding the prize either way, so there’s no reason to risk returning the funds.

How to promote your prize draw

Your existing audience first: Your email list is your most valuable asset. A prize draw email to your existing supporter database, members, past visitors, and newsletter subscribers should be the first thing you send before promoting anywhere else. People who already care about your zoo are most likely to enter and most likely to share.

Social media: Prize draws are naturally shareable. The prize should do most of the work; a video of the animal encounter you’re offering as the prize is worth a hundred text posts. Instagram and Facebook tend to work best for zoo audiences; TikTok is increasingly strong for wildlife content.

Repeat communications: Don’t just send one email and one post. Plan a promotion schedule: a launch announcement, a midpoint reminder with a progress update, a final week countdown, and a closing day push. Each touch point should have something new, an update on funds raised, a story from a keeper, a piece of animal content.

Press: Local press will often cover a well-framed prize draw, especially if the prize is genuinely unusual. “Win a private night at the zoo with [celebrity keeper name]” is a story. Lead with the prize and the conservation cause, not the fundraising mechanics.

Partner amplification: If your prize involves a hotel or travel partner, ask them to promote the draw to their own audience. Their guests and followers are a warm audience who may never have heard of your zoo. This is one of the most powerful reach extensions available to a prize draw and costs nothing extra.

Any advertising or promotional material for your draw must comply with the CAP Code, including making clear that a free entry route exists.

Picking your winner

When your draw closes, use Crowdfunder’s free random number generator to select your winner.

Before you run the draw, make sure all free entry route entries have been added to your list alongside the paid entries; every entrant must have an equal chance.

Record your inputs and outputs (the range of entry numbers, how many winners, and the winning number drawn) as your evidence of a fair draw.

Notify your winner promptly and announce the result publicly, on social media, in your next email, and on the prize draw page itself. A celebratory post with a photo of the winner enjoying their prize (with permission) is excellent content and builds trust for your next draw.

Making it repeatable

The zoos that raise the most from prize draws don’t run one and stop. Edinburgh Zoo ran twelve consecutive draws and built a community of over 16,000 supporters in the process. Each draw added names to their list, each winner became an advocate, and each campaign was easier to promote than the last.

A quarterly or seasonal draw, a spring animal encounter, a summer family experience, a Christmas magic moment, gives supporters something to look forward to and gives your fundraising team a reliable, repeatable income stream that doesn’t depend on a single campaign going viral.

The animal changes. The prize changes. The format stays the same. And it works every time.

Retargeting with Meta Pixel

If your zoo runs paid social advertising, adding the Meta Pixel to your prize draw campaign page lets you retarget everyone who visits but doesn’t enter. For organisations with a recognised brand and an existing audience, zoo members, past visitors, and conservation supporters, this is one of the most cost-effective ways to convert warm interest into entries. Someone who’s visited your zoo three times and clicked your draw page twice is far more likely to enter with a gentle retargeted reminder than a cold audience seeing your ad for the first time.

Crowdfunder supports Meta Pixel integration directly on your project page, so you can run retargeting campaigns without any custom development. For larger organisations already running social ads, it’s a meaningful lever, particularly in the final week of a draw when urgency is highest.

Real zoo prize draws on Crowdfunder

Edinburgh Zoo (RZSS) ran twelve prize draws on Crowdfunder, raising over £400,000 from thousands of supporters. What made their approach distinctive was consistency and variety: prizes ranged from private overnight zoo access and a luxury Waldorf Astoria hotel stay, to monthly Giant Panda Magic Moments, Christmas animal encounter draws offering 12 winners their choice of keeper experience, and a towering giraffe sculpture alongside a behind-the-scenes day with keepers. By running draws regularly and building a list of engaged supporters over time, Edinburgh Zoo turned prize draws into a reliable, repeatable income stream rather than a one-off campaign.

Wild Planet Trust (Paignton Zoo) ran a sloth meet and greet draw offering an exclusive encounter with Mo the sloth, from £5 per entry. The draw raised funds for the zoo’s conservation work and demonstrates how a single, well-loved animal can anchor an entire campaign.

Drusillas Park ran a prize draw on Flash the sloth’s birthday — a 30–40 minute non-contact sloth feeding experience for two people, with 100% of proceeds going to the Sloth Conservation Foundation. A good example of a draw with dual purpose: engaging visitors and directing funds to a named conservation partner.

Whipsnade Zoo is currently running a draw giving supporters the chance to help name their new elephant calf, from £5 per entry. The naming hook is a clever mechanic that gives entrants a sense of personal investment beyond just winning.

Yorkshire Wildlife Park ran a prize draw tied directly to a rescue mission: supporters could win a £1,500 family getaway to the park, including a luxury stay, meals and VIP perks, while helping fund the rescue and rehoming of a Ukrainian lion family. A strong example of how a prize draw can be built around a specific, urgent conservation story rather than a generic fundraising ask.

Bristol Zoo Project offered lifetime membership for two as their prize, raising funds for their conservation and education charity. Lifetime membership is one of the highest-value prizes a zoo can offer at near-zero cost, and it connects the winner directly to the organisation’s long-term mission.

Twycross Zoo is running a draw for the first-ever Ultimate Capybara Experience, as part of a wider campaign to raise £500,000 towards a world-class Bornean orangutan habitat. A great example of a prize draw used as a stepping stone toward a much bigger goal: the capybara experience generates excitement and funds while raising awareness of the orangutan project the money ultimately supports.

Ready to start?

Running a prize draw on Crowdfunder is free. There are no platform fees for not-for-profit zoos and wildlife parks, and support is available at every stage.

Start your prize draw

Read prize draw guidelines