How to Measure Raffle ROI

A raffle that raised more than last year is not necessarily a raffle that performed well, and a smaller campaign is not necessarily a weak one. The difference lies in return on investment: what your organization actually kept relative to what the raffle cost to run. The raffle ROI metrics nonprofit teams need are simpler than the term suggests, and once you know them, they answer the questions that matter: was this worth the effort, what should change next time, and should a raffle be part of next year's fundraising mix at all.

This guide covers how to calculate raffle ROI, the working benchmarks to judge your numbers against, and the levers that improve the return. It pairs with our guide to raffle ticket sales tracking, which covers how to capture these numbers in the first place.

What ROI Means for a Raffle

Raffle ROI is net raised relative to what it cost to get there. Gross revenue is the headline; net is the truth. A campaign with strong ticket sales, a purchased grand prize, and heavy printing costs can quietly return less to the cause than a smaller raffle with donated prizes and online sales. Measuring ROI stops the headline number from hiding the real one.

There is a second return most organizations forget to count: supporters. Every ticket buyer is a person who just engaged with your cause, and first-time buyers are new names on your list. A raffle with modest net revenue but a large batch of new supporters may be your best-performing acquisition activity of the year.

The Core ROI Metrics

Treat these as working rules rather than laws. They reflect the patterns we see across thousands of raffles run on GalaBid, but a first campaign, a small community, or an unusually ambitious prize can all sit outside them and still be the right call. The point of a benchmark is to prompt the question, not to end it.

Counting All the Costs

ROI is only as honest as the cost line. Include prize purchases and prize top-ups, printing and signage, permits and licence fees, platform or payment costs, paid promotion, and any venue or equipment spend tied to the raffle. Then note, separately, the volunteer hours involved. You do not need to price volunteer time into the formula, but a raffle that consumed two hundred volunteer hours competes with everything else those hours could have done, and next year's format decisions should know that number.

The most common costing mistake is counting only what was paid for during the campaign and forgetting what was committed before it, especially prizes bought months earlier. Capture costs from the first planning meeting onward, a habit covered in our guide to avoiding common raffle fundraiser mistakes.

What a Healthy Raffle Looks Like

Prize sourcing is the single biggest driver of the benchmarks above. A raffle with fully donated prizes and online ticket sales carries almost no cost base, so most of what comes in goes to the cause, and return multiples climb quickly. A purchased grand prize changes the maths entirely: the campaign must sell enough tickets to cover the prize before the cause receives anything, which is why the prize cost ratio deserves its own line in your review.

Format matters too. Online and hybrid campaigns tend to hold better cost ratios than paper-based raffles because printing disappears and admin shrinks, and hybrid campaigns typically post the strongest gross because they sell to the room and beyond it at the same time. A 50/50 raffle is the special case: the prize is a share of the pot, so prize cost scales automatically and can never sink the campaign, at the cost of a lower net margin by design.

Improving Raffle ROI

Each metric points at its own lever. A weak net margin with donated prizes means the cost base has crept, usually printing, paid ads, or fees, so move sales online and renegotiate. A high prize cost ratio means the sourcing ask needs to happen earlier and wider; our scripts and templates for requesting donated prizes exist for exactly this. A low return multiple with healthy margins usually means the campaign was simply too small for its fixed effort, so the answer is reach, not cost-cutting. And a strong result with weak new supporter numbers says the promotion stayed inside your existing audience, so next campaign leads with sharing, partners, and sponsor audiences.

Ticket pricing sits underneath all of it, because the same audience at a better price and bundle structure changes every ratio at once. Our guide on how to price raffle tickets covers that side of the equation.

Comparing Raffles With Other Fundraisers

ROI metrics also settle a bigger question: where the raffle sits in your annual mix. Compare net raised per volunteer hour and cost ratio against your other activities, an event, an appeal, a sausage sizzle, and be fair about it: include the acquisition value of new buyers, which most other activities do not generate at the same rate. Many organizations find the raffle is not their largest fundraiser but is their most efficient one, which argues for running it more often, not bigger. Where the numbers point the other way, that is worth knowing too. The formats and tactics shifting those numbers year to year are covered in our guide to raffle trends for 2026.

Raffle ROI Review Checklist

• All costs captured, from first planning meeting to draw day
• Net raised and net margin calculated
• Cost ratio and prize cost ratio calculated
• Return multiple compared against the 3x working benchmark
• New supporters counted and added to your list
• Volunteer hours noted alongside the numbers
• Results compared with your previous raffles and other fundraisers
• One change identified for next campaign

FAQs

How do you calculate ROI for a raffle?

Divide net raised (gross revenue minus all costs) by total costs. A result of 3 means the raffle returned three times what it cost to run. Alongside it, calculate net margin, which is net raised divided by gross revenue, to see what share of every ticket reached the cause.

What is a good ROI for a raffle fundraiser?

As a working rule, a return multiple of 3x or better is healthy and 5x or more is strong. Net margin above 70% is achievable when prizes are donated and sales are online; 50 to 60% is more typical when prizes are purchased.

What percentage of raffle revenue should go to costs?

Keep total costs under 30% of gross revenue, and well under 15% for online raffles with donated prizes. The prize is usually the swing factor, so it gets its own ratio: donated is the goal, and under 25% of gross if purchased.

Should volunteer time count in raffle ROI?

Track the hours, but keep them out of the formula. Volunteer time is better used to compare activities, for example net raised per volunteer hour across your raffle, your gala, and your appeal, than to deflate a single campaign's numbers.

Why did our raffle raise a lot but return little?

Almost always a cost problem rather than a sales problem: a purchased grand prize, heavy printing, or paid promotion that outgrew its return. Recalculate the prize cost ratio first, since that is the most common culprit.

How do we know if we should run a raffle again next year?

Compare its return multiple, cost ratio, and net per volunteer hour against your other fundraisers, and add the value of new supporters acquired. If the raffle is efficient but small, the answer is usually to run it again with wider reach rather than to replace it.

See Your Raffle ROI as It Happens with GalaBid

GalaBid gives you live reporting on sales, buyers, and revenue while the campaign runs, so the metrics in this guide take minutes to produce rather than an evening with a spreadsheet. Explore the online raffle software trusted by thousands of nonprofits, schools, and clubs.

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