On behalf of all cancer-stricken children and their families, thank you for signing up for the Leucan Shaved Head Challenge, presented by Proxim.

This Guide contains information, tips, and tools to help you through every step of your Challenge: fundraising, preparing for your shave, the big day, and the post-Challenge phase.

A Leucan contact person will be in touch regularly to support you through this experience. Please do not hesitate to contact this person if you have any questions.

Fundraising

Beyond a gesture of solidarity with cancer-stricken children confronted with hair loss due to chemotherapy, the Leucan Shaved Head Challenge is a major fundraising campaign geared toward providing direct and essential services to families and children.

Once your online registration is complete, you are now ready to collect donations.

Customize your fundraising profile

Once you are logged in your profile, go to the My Fundraiser tab, write an introduction message, and add some pictures. This way, people will know what motivated you to take on the Challenge and be more likely to contribute to your fundraiser.

Customize your team’s fundraising profile
If you are the leader of a Group Challenge, you can also write an introduction and add pictures in your group’s profile page. Only the team leader has access to those features.

Make your profile bilingual
The introduction you write will appear on both the French and English versions of the website. If you want a bilingual introduction, you will need to write the text in both languages with the text in one language following the other.

Join the Facebook group

Join the Leucan Shaved Head Challenge Current and Past Participants Facebook Group to share your experience, be a part of a wonderful community of committed and supportive participants, and learn some tips to raise more money.

Talk about your Challenge in your network!

Social media
Share the link to your profile page on social media where you are active (e.g. Facebook).

Individual messages
Send individualized messages to the people in your social circle by e-mail, Facebook Messenger, or any other messaging system you use. You also have the option of sending e-mails from your fundraising profile by using the Solicit Donations tab.

Make it your own

Leucan makes a range of ideas and tools available to help you in your fundraising efforts (shareable videos to promote your Challenge, e-mail signatures, Facebook cover pictures, frames for your Facebook profile picture, donation boxes).

Join the Leucan Shaved Head Challenge Current and Past Participants Facebook Group

Fundraising tips

  • Host an empty-your-pockets day to collect donations at work, school, etc.
  • Ask your friends and family to make a donation in lieu of a gift on your birthday.
  • Bake muffins or other sweet treats and hold a bake sale for your friends, colleagues, family members, etc.
  • Ask your school or company management if you can organize a jeans/pyjama/uniform-free day in exchange for a $X donation.
  • Display the picture of a cancer-stricken child and their story along with a basket at the cafeteria, in the lunch room, etc. to collect donations.
  • Hold a garage sale and announce that all proceeds will go toward your fundraiser for the Leucan Shaved Head Challenge!
  • Organize a used books sale.
  • Ask your hairdresser if they would be willing to donate $2 per haircut over a weekend or if you could leave a donation box with flyers at their reception desk.

Include a Leucan Shaved Head Challenge visual to your e-mail signature and a link to your profile page.

E-mail signature

  • Include a Leucan Shaved Head Challenge visual to your e-mail signature and a link to your profile page

Facebook

  • Use a Challenge visual in your profile cover picture.
  • Apply our Leucan Shaved Head Challenge Facebook frame to your Facebook profile picture.

Donation boxes

  • Reach out to your Leucan contact person to plan the shipping of donation boxes.

Collect donations

Online
Donors using the secure online payment by credit card will automatically receive a tax receipt by e-mail.

Cash or cheque
Please complete a donation form for each cash or cheque donation and include it with your donations remittance. Leucan will issue tax receipts based on the completed forms. A tax receipt will be issued on demand for any donation of $20 or more. The form is available under the Donation Form tab of your fundraising profile. To add cash and cheque donations to the total shown in your profile thermometer, please enter them manually using the Add Cash and Cheque Donations tab in your fundraising profile.

Thank your donors
A thank-you e-mail is sent automatically to online donors. Even so, Leucan recommends that you take the time to thank each donor individually. You may do so directly from your fundraising profile, under the Manage Donors tab, or use any other messaging system of your choice.

Increase your fundraising goal

If you reach your fundraising goal (congratulations!), you may increase it using the My Fundraiser tab. Let your donors know that, thanks to their generosity, you have reached your goal and can now increase it. This might serve as an incentive for people who have not donated to your campaign yet: they will want to help you reach your new goal.

“I had a modest goal of $100, but kept on receiving more donations every day. I wound up raising $1,100!”

The shave

The Challenge may be your first time getting your head shaved or handling an electric razor. To help you through this process, Leucan developed a quick FAQ about the shaving step.

Who will shave my head?

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we had to suspend all in-person events.

For that reason, whether you take on the Challenge privately or during a virtual event on Zoom (in compliance with all public health measures), someone from your household will have to shave your head. You may also do the shaving yourself. We developed a few tutorials to help you with this step.

What material do I need?

You will need an electric razor (see examples X, Y, and Z). If your hair is long, you will also need a few hair elastics and a pair of scissors to cut your hair shorter prior to shaving it. For safety reasons, the use of a manual razor is forbidden. Leucan does not provide razors or scissors. If you don’t own this equipment, see if you could borrow it from someone in your circle before buying it.

What is the procedure to follow to send my hair?

Leucan does not collect hair donations from the Challenge. However, the money raised via the Challenge enables Leucan to provide children with a wig service on demand. Leucan decided not to manage hair donations due to logistics issues, opting instead to focus its efforts on offering direct services to families.

To donate your hair, please see the list of Leucan-recommended organizations and their criteria during for hair donations during the pandemic.

The big day

With the day of your Challenge approaching fast, you may feel a myriad of emotions all at once: excited, proud, serene, nervous… Don’t hesitate to talk about how you feel with people who have taken on the Challenge in the past by joining the Leucan Shaved Head Challenge Current and Past Participants Facebook Group.

Set the mood

In anticipation for the day of your Challenge, your contact person at Leucan will be mailing you a kit containing a few Leucan-branded items (bandana, balloons, temporary tattoos and stickers), and a giant symbolic cheque to write down and display the amount you raised. Use those items to decorate your environment and add to the festive ambiance!

Document your shave

This is a big moment! Here are a few tips to capture memories of that day:

  • Take a picture of yourself before and after the Challenge.
  • If possible, have someone take pictures and/or videos of you while you are getting your head shaved.
  • If you are doing the Challenge alone, prop your phone or camera so that you can film yourself or take pictures while you are shaving your head.

Share your Challenge

If you feel comfortable doing so, we encourage you to share pictures or videos of your Challenge on social media. Please use the #leucan hashtag and make your posts public so to enable the team of Leucan to interact with your content.

Also, feel free to share your photos and videos in the Leucan Shaved Head Challenge Current and Past Participants Facebook Group and expect a huge wave of love from our community.

Celebrate

Seeing your newly shaved head for the first time is a poignant moment. You have every reason to be extremely proud of yourself! In front of you stands the proof that beauty goes way beyond one’s hair. Bravo!

Apply our Leucan Shaved Head Challenge Facebook frame to your Facebook profile picture to flaunt your new look and promote the cause to as many people as possible. Bonus: You can continue to collect donations after your Challenge. Make sure to include the link to your fundraising page to your new-profile-picture post.

“As soon as it was done, relief washed over me. I knew then that my action had made a difference.” -A participant

“I was feeling so many emotions about my sister for whom I was doing the Challenge. I hugged her close, and we cried together. I think that in that moment, she truly felt all my love for her.” -A participant

“I cried tears of joy because I knew I had taken concrete action to help others. It was like this huge surge of adrenaline.” -A participant

“It was a strange feeling but I’m glad I did it!” -A participant

“It was special. It’s pretty incredible to feel the wind on my head.” -A participant

“It was a maelstrom of emotions: hesitation, excitement, awe, solidarity, sensitivity, understanding… At first, I had trouble imagining what it felt like for people who go through this because they are sick. It’s hard to explain. To truly understand it, you need to live it.” -A participant

“I look beautiful with a shaved head. I know because this is my second Challenge.” -A participant

The post-challenge

You are now a proud ambassador of Leucan and the cause of cancer-stricken children and will continue to be for a few months.

Your first time out in public

A shaved head draws people’s attention. Some participants confess to feeling nervous the first time they go out in public with their new look. Set your mind at ease! The same individuals report having been greeted with surprise, pride, and admiration.

If you feel your self-confidence wavering, take a moment to remind yourself of the reasons why you took on the Leucan Shaved Head Challenge. No matter the motivation behind your decision, remember that your new look is a symbol of solidarity with children afflicted with cancer and that the money you raise will help Leucan to continue to provide essential services to hundreds of families.

Regrowth

Growing back one’s hair after a shave is a challenge in itself. Join the Leucan Shaved Head Challenge Current and Past Participants Facebook group to benefit from a multitude of tips and advice from other participants who have done the Challenge before you on how to care for your scalp and maintain your haircut while it grows back.

We can also recommend that you see a hairdresser who can provide you with tips on how to take care of your scalp and hair during regrowth.