Cancer No Bueno to go out with a bang

With Cancer No Bueno having raised awareness and funds for the Leukaemia Foundation since 2014, the event’s directors will step away this August and let us others continue their work.

Laurie Davidson, Brittany Lovell and Jaylee Osbourne had a few simple goals when they organised the first Cancer No Bueno event in 2014, principal among them being to raise awareness of leukaemia.

Having done some work for breast cancer charities in the past, the three were motivated to hold a fundraising event after two of their closest friends were diagnosed with the blood cell cancer.

Held at the WACA Ground, the first event was for friends and family members to help raise money and awareness for the Leukaemia Foundation.

Six years later, Cancer No Bueno has become a popular black-tie event, raising $250,000 and attracting sponsors including Coates Hire, Revamp’d Hair Studio and All Works WA.

However, this year’s fundraiser, to be held on August 24, will be the last, with the founders telling Business News the time demands of organising Cancer No Bueno had grown to the point where they were no longer able to devote their full attention to it, and they had decided to step aside.

Reflecting on the event’s successes, Ms Davidson said she was amazed at how Cancer No Bueno had transformed during its lifetime.

“We didn’t really have an idea of what we wanted to do [with the first event], we just wanted to raise awareness,” she said.

“People don’t think cancer affects Gen Y, they think it’s just old people, but it’s something that’s real.”

Initially not primarily focused on the amount of money they raised, Ms Davidson said the group was surprised and thrilled when they learned the first event had collected $20,000 for the Leukaemia Foundation.

As news of that success soon spread, the co-founders decided to hold a larger event one year later at the Pan Pacific, inviting marketing professional Alison Balch to join as a director and help build the event’s marketing and public relations arm.

“I came as a guest that year, but ended up working for them on the night because I was astounded that they had created an event like this,” Ms Balch told Business News.

“We’re bombarded all the time about mental health and breast cancer charities because they’ve got big budgets.

“Leukaemia, though, is something that is not as front of mind, and I was just amazed at what they had created.”

In the intervening years, Cancer No Bueno moved into bigger and more prestigious venues, with Centenary Pavilion set to host this year’s event.

Reflecting on the event’s success over the years, both Ms Davidson and Ms Balch agreed that engaging with and catering for millennials had been integral.

Ms Balch said the engagement with that younger cohort had come from pitching Cancer No Bueno as a way to combine millennials’ love of a good time with its love of a good cause.

“We’re very aware as millennials ourselves that we’re not the most loyal generation,” she said.

“Brand loyalty doesn’t matter like it used to, so we’re grateful to have people who came to the first few events coming to the last.”

Six years on from the first Cancer No Bueno, both Ms Davidson and Ms Balch said the format of the event had shifted to where it now offered what they call a curated experience, getting rid of standard festivities like silent auctions and replacing them with ‘buenvelopes’, where hundreds of donated prizes are raffled off for $20 a ticket.

“It’s not just about sticking speakers on stage and expecting people to listen to them, because once you get thousands of people in a room it’s hard to capture their attention,” Ms Balch said.

“We have to get them to engage right there and then.”

Ms Davidson said those additions were made over the years in response to a generation brought up with a need for instant gratification.

“We buy clothes online and we expect them the next day,” she said.

“We wanted to make sure we were keeping up with those expectations.”

With Cancer No Bueno growing in popularity year after year, Ms Balch said now was the right time to end the event, citing the need for the four directors to attend to their own careers and families.

She’s confident, however, that Cancer No Bueno will provide a template that can be easily replicated by others who have the capacity to run such an event.

“I think the difficulties we face personally meant it was our time to end, but it doesn’t mean there isn’t space for an event like this in the market,” Ms Balch said.

“Since we started, there have been a number of different events come about that are similar to ours, and I think what [those events have] picked up from us is that fundraising has to be a secondary message.

“If you can get people into a room and get them to feel something, that’s when you can get them to take action.”