‘Chase the Ace’ fundraisers continue to raise large sums for communities

SALEM, S.D. (Dakota News Now) - “Chase the Ace” fundraisers have quickly become popular in South Dakota for all sorts of causes, from community funds to emergency service fundraisers. And they’ve been helped by online sales, allowing people from all over the country to get in on the chance to win.

Plenty of people poured into Salem Thursday night for one final draw of the McCook Country Club’s “Chase the Ace.” Headed into the evening, the pot sat at around $360,000. After the the tickets bought for the final draw in person and online, the estimated pot was over $500,000. The card to chase, the ace of clubs, was the last card in the deck, meaning whoever was drawn Thursday night would split it with the club.

“It’s unbelievable that it hasn’t been drawn out until now. I even tried to Google the odds of it being the last card, and I could never come up with an answer.” MCC Board President Brian Weber said.

The club’s share will be going towards improvements to the clubhouse, and course cleanup after two damaging storms hit the community earlier this summer.

MORE: Salem continues to cleanup damage from second derecho

“Nine-hole courses, generally as a rule, are not overly profitable. It takes a lot of community effort, a lot of community donations of time, and money and labor.” MCC Board Member Doug Seubert said.

The amount of money raised wouldn’t have been possible without online sales, opening up the contest to many others from all over. For the country club and other smaller communities, it’s been a solution to fundraising when there’s only so much to go around.

“And then, we saw what they were doing in Faulkton with Venmo, and how that just blew up. So we decided to open it up to Venmo, and you did not have to be present. That made a huge difference as far as bringing in the money.” Weber said.

These fundraisers have shown it’s taken a team of individuals to pull off, like last year’s “Chase the Ace” fundraiser in Faulkton. But the results have been worth the work.

MORE: Winner drawn for Faulkton’s $1.8 million “Chase the Ace’

“We struggled for a long time. There would be nights where there was $300, $400 in the pot. It takes a lot of time and a lot of commitment, and a lot of people putting money in every week to get to this point.” Seubert said.

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