Families stay together
A party moves together, after a confirmation, and everyone in it is placed at the same table.
Use case: vision dinners
Your table hosts fill the room. We help you see it happening.
Vision dinner registration built around table hosts. Recruit hosts, watch their tables fill, seat the room, and check everyone in at the door.
Free to attend, hard to see
A gala charges for spots. A vision dinner is free to attend
The room is free, the meal is covered, and the money comes from the ask at the end of the night. So everything rests on one question: did your table hosts actually fill their tables?
The room is smaller than it should have been, and the ask lands on fewer people than the mission deserved.
Book a Demo
See the Host Dashboard with a real dinner in it.
The short answer
What is a vision dinner, and how do you run one?
A vision dinner is a free-to-attend fundraising dinner where volunteer table hosts invite their own friends, the organization shares its mission from the stage, and guests are invited to give at the end of the night.
There is nothing to charge for. Guests register for a free spot, so the whole event rises or falls on whether hosts fill their tables. FundEasy is built for that. On events built from the Vision Dinner template, you make anyone a host in one click, hosts are sent editable instruction emails, guests register free and choose their host from a dropdown, and guests can invite others themselves.
A Host Dashboard shows every host’s invited and registered counts in one view, so you know who to call. Groups are placed at a table as a whole on Seating, name tags print by table, and live check-in runs the door on an iPad.
Afterward, the Groups & Hosts report shows exactly who each host brought.
Where the dinner lives
The night runs on the Events and Attendance module: hosts, registration, seating, check-in, and reporting. The full feature set is on the attendance and event management software page.
Where the gift lives
Giving Pages carry the ask, Recurring Giving carries the donors it converts, and offline transactions carry the checks handed in at the table. Same account, same records.
If you are a pregnancy center
Centers on the eKYROS EMR run their vision dinners on this same platform, with event participation and donation records syncing back to eKYROS.
Product in action
From the first host invitation to the ask
Set up the night
Set up the vision dinner. RSVP-style registration, no predefined guest quantities, then the setup wizard for dates, venue, attendance goal, theme, and the text on your registration page.
After the event, the reports you need are already built
- Groups & Hosts report
- Simple Attendee Roster
- Meal Choice Report
- Event Summary
Book a Demo
Walk through these same screens with your dinner in mind.
What changes when the hosts are visible
01
See every host, and every table, at a glance
- The Host Dashboard shows how many hosts you have and how many guests each one invited.
- It also shows how many of those guests actually registered, and who has no host attached.
- Sort by who is furthest ahead and who needs a call this week.
- Guests are arranged on Groups & Hosts, on Seating, and in the Groups & Hosts report.
02
Let hosts do the inviting
- Guests can invite new people to register, so a host works their own list.
- No routing every name through your office and back again.
- Send Host Instructions from an email template you can edit.
- Resend it to the hosts who need a nudge, without resending to everyone.
03
Fix the host list as it changes
- Make anyone a host in one click when someone steps up. A group can have no host, one host, or several.
- Remove a host when they cannot, and their group stays together.
- Add a guest to a host group yourself from the Group Host Manager when they call the office.
- Guests choose their host from a dropdown, so every registration is attributed from the start.
04
Seat the room, then run the door
- On Seating, drag a group onto a table so the whole group is placed together.
- Table colors show Empty, Seats open, Full, and Over capacity.
- Print name tags by table or by last name.
- Check everyone in on an iPad, and know who is in the room before the ask.
Organizations filling rooms this way
More supporters in the room, which is the whole point
Quote slot
The plan
How a vision dinner runs on FundEasy
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Step one
Set up the vision dinner
RSVP-style registration with no predefined guest quantities, so hosts are not locked to a table count before they have started.
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Step two
Recruit and equip your hosts
Add your hosts, send editable host instructions, and let them invite their own guests. Guests choose their host when they register, so every registration is attributed.
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Step three
Watch the Host Dashboard
See who is ahead and who is stalled, and make the calls that actually move the number.
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Step four
Seat, check in, and follow up
Groups are placed at a table as a whole, name tags print by table, live check-in runs the door, and the Groups & Hosts report tells you who each host brought.
Next year, duplicate the event and import this year’s invitation list into it.
How the gift actually happens
A vision dinner does not charge for spots, so where does the money come from?
From the ask, at the end of the night. FundEasy runs the dinner: the hosts, the registration, the seating, the door. The giving runs on a giving page you point people to from the stage and in the follow-up email, and you can have it live before anyone sits down.
Set up an Easy Giving Page or a goal-based Crowdfunding page for the night, put the link and a QR code on the table cards and the screen, and watch the total move. Every giving page shows progress, one-time gifts, recurring gifts, new donors, and recurring donors at the top.
The pledge cards and checks people hand you at the table are not left out. Record them as offline transactions against a contact, attach them to the campaign, and they count in the totals right alongside the online gifts.
Then do the part most organizations skip. A first-time guest who gave once at a dinner is the best candidate you have for a monthly gift, and recurring giving is on every giving page by default.
Book a Demo
We’ll walk you through the dinner and the giving page side by side.
Which night are you running
Vision dinner or gala?
| Feature | Vision Dinner | Gala |
|---|---|---|
| Cost to attend | Free | Paid |
| How the room fills | Table hosts invite their own guests | Guests pay for spots and tables |
| Where the money comes from | The ask at the end of the night | Paid spots, tables, sponsorships, plus the ask |
| Sponsors self-register | No | Yes |
| Early bird and late pricing | Not applicable | Yes |
| Host Dashboard | Yes | No |
| Guests can invite others | Yes | No |
| Seating | Optional | Optional |
| Live check-in | Yes | Yes |
How to choose: if your supporters expect to pay to come, and you have sponsors ready to underwrite the night, run a gala. If your best asset is thirty people who will each bring seven friends, run a vision dinner. Plenty of organizations run one of each in a year. The banquet and gala use case page covers the paid night in full.
Sponsors work with every event, including a vision dinner where hosts fill the tables.
Book a Demo
Not sure which one fits your night? We will pick it with you.
The rest of the year
The dinner is one night. The relationship is not
- The giving page that carries the ask sits on the same account as the dinner.
- Recurring giving turns the guests who said yes once into monthly partners.
- Peer-to-peer puts your hosts to work raising before the night, not just filling tables.
See the Host Dashboard with a real dinner in it
Tell us about your hosts and your date. In thirty minutes we’ll walk you through hosts, registration, seating, and the door.
Everything the dinner can use
Select any capability to read what it does.
Select any capability to read what it does.
This release
Built from what you told us
Hosts stay put
Hosts stay put when a registration is edited.
No duplicates
Whole groups are placed at a table at once, so the same guests are not seated twice.
Change once
Change a guest once, and Attendees, Groups & Hosts, and Seating all update.
Questions
Vision dinner questions
Still deciding? Bring your dinner to a demo and we will answer these against your own night.
What is a vision dinner?
A vision dinner is a free-to-attend fundraising dinner where volunteer table hosts invite their own guests, the organization presents its mission from the stage, and guests are invited to give at the end of the evening. It is common among pregnancy resource centers, ministries, and faith-based nonprofits, and it is sometimes called an appeal dinner or a banquet. Because guests register for a free spot, the size of the room depends entirely on whether hosts fill their tables.
How do table hosts work in FundEasy?
On events built from the Vision Dinner template, make anyone a host in one click. A group can have no host, one host, or several. Guests choose their host from a dropdown on the registration form, so every registration is attributed. Guests can invite new people themselves, so a host works their own list without going through your office. Hosts receive a Host Instructions email you can edit, preview, and resend. The Host Dashboard shows every host with their invited and registered counts in one view, including guests with no host attached. Remove a host and their group stays together.
Can guests give at the dinner?
The gift does not happen on the event registration page. Registration is for the RSVP. The giving runs on a giving page you point people to from the stage, on the table cards, and in the follow-up email, and you can have it live before anyone sits down. Checks and pledge cards handed in at the table are recorded as offline transactions against a contact and attached to the campaign, so they count in the same total as the online gifts.
How do you seat a vision dinner?
On Seating. You choose a table shape, the number of tables, and seats per table, then place a guest, a party, or a whole group so a host is placed with the guests they invited. Everyone in a party is placed at the same table. Cancelled and declined guests are not placed at a table. Table colors show Empty, Seats open, Full, and Over capacity. The finished layout prints or downloads as a PDF for the venue. Name tags print in order by table or by last name.
How is a vision dinner different from a gala?
A gala charges for spots, sponsors underwrite the night, and guests pay for a table. A vision dinner is free to attend, table hosts recruit the room, and the money comes from the ask at the end. In FundEasy, a vision dinner uses the Host Dashboard and lets guests invite others, while a gala uses paid registration, early bird pricing, promo codes, and sponsor tiers. Host tools are on events built from the Vision Dinner template. The banquet and gala page covers the paid night in full.
How do we follow up with everyone who came?
Start with who actually came. The Groups and Hosts report shows who each host brought, and the attendee roster plus check-in data shows who walked in. Event email lets you write, preview, and send to groups or individuals, with a View Recipients list on anything you sent. Point the follow-up at your giving page so guests who meant to give that night still can.
Can we reuse this event next year?
Yes. Duplicate the event to start from everything you already built, including your registration form, host setup, and page text. Archive the old event so this year's list stays clean. Then bring last year's guests in as this year's first invitations.