One Last Lunch

It wouldn’t seem to be a good fundraising opportunity, lunch for 90 minutes, with one person. That is unless that one person happens to be the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett. 

Since 2000, Warren Buffett has annually offered to eat lunch with the highest bidder in an auction with the proceeds going to the Glide Foundation, a San Francisco Bay charity that serves the homeless population. In 2003 it went electronic with eBay becoming the formal online platform. In 2006 it became a meal for eight people, including the winner. The first bidder in 2000, who won, paid $25,000. In 2019, the last year of the lunch, before the pandemic, a bidder paid $4.6 million. To date, these lunches have raised more than $34 million for the foundation.

It’s almost like an old interview question: if you could have dinner with three people who are they be and why? In actuality, it’s turned out to be a true fundraising event. For those of us in the general public, not at Warren Buffett‘s level, you would think this would be easy. Why doesn’t he do it a bunch of times? Having been around many wealthy and famous people, most of the time all they want is a little bit more anonymity. A sense of peace and quiet. Believe it or not, just to live their lives. These kinds of events bring a great deal of attention and for many, that’s against what they’re aiming for at least a few times a week.

So one last lunch for the 91-year-old Oracle of Omaha. No doubt the bid will be much larger than the 2019 record of $4.6 million. And sometimes just the opportunity to sit and chat is worth a lot more than we realize.

Learn more about the auction here: https://bit.ly/3y9CUPd