In January 2005, following the devastating Tsunami in Southeast Asia, the members of Barenaked.Net organized a teacup auction to raise funds for relief efforts. The auction was a great success, and not only raised over $3100 for Unicef, but provided people with the opportunity to win amazing BNL memorabilia.

As soon as we realized the horrors of Katrina, we began to gather more goods for another auction, this time benefiting the American Red Cross. Although we were worried that we might have handed out all of the best memorabilia in the first auction, BNL fans came through once again with a wonderful assortment of goods to bid on.

If you are not familiar with a Teacup Auction, it works a little differently than a regular auction. Instead of items going to the highest bidder, your donated money earns you 'tickets'. These tickets can be put towards the items you are interested in. At the end of the auction, the winner of each item will be chosen via a drawing from all of the tickets entered for that item.

For example, if Susan donates $5, she will earn one ticket, which she can place towards the item of her choice, for example, #2. Now if she donates $20, she will earn five tickets. She could then place 3 tickets towards item #2 and 2 tickets towards item #7. Obviously, the more tickets you put towards an item, the better chance you have of winning it, but since the drawings are random, even someone who only puts in 1 ticket still has a chance to win!