How to Run a Fair Raffle or Giveaway

A raffle or giveaway is only as good as people’s trust in it. Get the mechanics right and you build goodwill; get them wrong — or even just appear to — and you invite accusations of favouritism. This guide walks through how to run a raffle that is fair, transparent and easy to defend, whether it is a school fundraiser or an online giveaway.

1. Write clear rules before you start

Decide and publish the essentials up front: who is eligible, how to enter, the entry deadline, how many prizes and winners there are, how the draw will happen, and how winners will be notified. Clear rules prevent disputes and are often a legal requirement for promotions. The single most important line: state the drawing method in advance.

2. Make every entry equal

Fairness starts with one entry, one chance — unless your rules explicitly allow extra entries (for example, one per ticket bought), in which case be transparent about it. However entries work, the system must give each its stated chance with no hidden weighting. Number your entries sequentially so each maps to exactly one number.

3. Choose a transparent drawing method

For a physical event, a tumbler drum or names from a well-mixed container, drawn in front of the audience, is hard to beat for visible fairness. For online or large draws, assign every entry a number and use a random number generator — it scales to thousands of entries and, with the “no repeats” option turned on, can draw 1st, 2nd and 3rd place as distinct winners in one go.

4. Draw multiple winners the right way

If you have several prizes, the cleanest approach is to draw unique numbers so the same person cannot win twice (unless your rules allow it). Our generator’s “no repeats” setting does this automatically. Alternatively, draw winners in prize order — grand prize first — and remove each winner before the next draw. A name picker with “remove the winner” enabled handles this beautifully for named entrants.

5. Make it verifiable

Transparency is what turns a fair draw into a trusted one. For higher-stakes giveaways, record the draw on video, draw live on a stream, or have an impartial witness present. Announce the method and the seed/time publicly. The goal is that anyone sceptical could look at your process and agree it was square.

6. Notify winners and honour the result

Contact winners promptly using the method stated in your rules, and give a reasonable, pre-stated window for them to claim. Decide in advance what happens if a winner does not respond (commonly, a re-draw for that prize only). Never quietly re-draw simply because you would have preferred a different winner — that is the cardinal sin of raffles.

Common mistakes that wreck trust

• Choosing the method after entries close. Always decide it beforehand.
• Using a method nobody can verify. “I picked one” is not good enough for a prize draw.
• Allowing accidental duplicate entries. De-duplicate your list first.
• Re-drawing for a ‘better’ winner. The fastest way to lose everyone’s trust.

A quick checklist

Before you draw: rules published? entries numbered and de-duplicated? method announced? Witness or recording ready (if needed)? After you draw: winner contacted? result honoured? If you can tick all of those, you have run a genuinely fair raffle — and Mohoh’s number generator and name picker make the drawing part effortless and beyond dispute.