Okay, so since I’ve been creating a team, I’ve emailed many businesses about our group. I’ve waited very patiently and still have not received any replies. I am unsure if this is simply because they are skipping it or it is going into a spam folder due to files being attached to the email. If you feel as if the attached files are the problem, how am I able to fix this issue? If you have other suggestions of what this may be, please say.
Thank you 
Thank you as well. I like to hear everyone’s opinion in this forum. I always want to hear both sides of a story. I feel like I can make a team, I got much of my inspiration from a local team we played against this season. http://mikerland99.wix.com/harberrobotics
They managed to make a team without any school funding and get it running in under a year. They even made it to Worlds!
Welcome to the real world.
But seriously, you can send a polite follow up email, although as others have mentioned you probably won’t have much luck just emailing businesses. Going to local small businesses in person (after calling or emailing to arrange a time) is better, and it’s best if you can connect with companies you know through family and friends.
In terms of attachments, most modern spam filters wouldn’t block them, but there are still plenty of archaic systems in use. You could just include a link in your email to a dropbox or website upload of the file instead.
I’m sure you’ll be able to find funding, you just need to find the right people to ask and lots of patience. Good luck!
I really thank you for the help. 
Do not email companies for sponsorship. They hate that! Most major companies actually have a portal from which you email them. I know alot of companies use conxport.com, here’s tmobil’s link: https://public.conxport.com/tmobile/sponsorship/
and a lot use versaic. Here’s Dell’s link:
https://dell.versaic.com/login
Notice a pattern? Here’s Exxon’s sponsor link:
https://exxonmobil.versaic.com/loginc
Anyways just try to find their sponsorship site for the company you’re trying to reach. Never email them. There is no point. I’ve gone through this process before and I’m telling you, every single large company turned me down. Hopefully you’ll have better luck.
On Exxon’s sponsor link, it gives me several options for sponsorships:
Motorsport Sponsorship - Team/Individual
Motorsport Sponsorship - Circuit/Event
Sports Sponsorship
Event Sponsorship (non sport)
Individuals/Endorsements (Athletes, Celebrities, etc.)
Marketing Partnership
Which would you recommend?
None of them. Notice a pattern? They’re probably looking for big events for big marketing. As a robotics team you cannot offer the sort of large or nationwide exposure big companies would want. It’s the small local ones that would care more about helping a local group and getting some local marketing at local events. I wouldn’t even bother with big companies, the chance of a robotics team getting money from them is much smaller than it’s worth.
Edit: By that I mean just any random big company. There are some STEM area companies that are definitely interested, and some have grants and the like you can apply for. Here is for example a list of grants: http://www.roboticseducation.org/for-participants/team-grants/
Contact your local newspaper and try to convince them to do a story on your team and show off your machines. Then, as others have already suggested, contact your local businesses. Find out if there are any organizations in your community that are something like business “clubs” or whatever, such as the Optimists, or whatever they are called, or contact your local Chamber of Commerce and find out who runs the town and how they influence local politics, etc. Find a local Boy Scout or Girl Scout group you can ask or, if you get desperate, ask the local Sheriff, “Who’s who in town?”
Unless they just so happen to be headquartered close by, the big companies tend to ignore requests, so don’t let their silence get to you. Some grocery stores and restaurants will sometimes allow you to do something like a sidewalk fundraiser by your showing up and showing off your robots while you collect donations or sell stuff, like Hexbugs or candy bars, etc.
You have to tailor your fundraising to your particular circumstances, town politics, local personalities, etc. What somebody is doing in downtown LA won’t necessarily work in rural Wisconsin, so you’ll just have to get your pulse on however it is your local community operates.
Tyson Foods Headquarters is in my city and Walmart Headquarters is 15 minutes from my house…
Those sound like fairly good connections to me. Start with getting your smiling faces in the local paper, then find out from the local “Powers That Be” how to contact the local reps of those places. But, actually, if your local economy is doing fairly well, you might be fully supported by contacting just your local business dudes - car dealers, electrical contractor people, restaurants, things like that.
I contacted several car dealerships.
I would also literally go door to door at a strip mall or what-have-you and ask for sponsorship. You (probably) won’t get thousands of dollars, but hundreds is certainly possible, and it’s a lot harder to ignore a body than an email.
Also, depending on what professions and companies your friends, family, and family friends are involved in, it might be worth going through them to try to get a contact inside a business that can give you support. My dad used to work for IBM, and they had a program where they would match any donation he made to a nonprofit organization. I don’t exactly remember how the process worked and what the qualifications were, but that was one of my team’s ideas for getting funds. There might be a similar program at the companies your family members work at, or some other way they can get their companies to sponsor you. Another thing you could do is do something similar to a school fundraiser (not necessarily at or associated with a school), where you sell food or little things that you made for a few dollars each. It may take a bit of work, but that seems to me like it’d be a good place to start.
Yeah the problem with finding sponsorships is that even local businesses want to give to a 501c organization rather than a random group. Even in the portals that I posted, they ask for a non-profit organization. Does anyone know how to counter this? Any way that a private team could maybe work with a 501c or something to make them look trusted?
Your first problem was emailing them.
You NEED to speak to them in person. Unless they’re a large corporation, give them a call, and set up an appointment to meet with them.
You can drive around town, and stop at all of your local businesses. Bring a robot if you see fit, but dress nicely, I can promise an email won’t do anything. In the past two years, I’ve sent out about 300 emails in regards to sponsorships, only about 30 of which got responded to, and only 3 of which decided to sponsor our team. Sponsorships are extremely hit or miss, and you need to make sure that you are going about finding sponsors properly.
EDIT: If you send too many of the same email, just replacing small bits of it, it’ll get caught in the spam filter.
There is a 501©(3) that was created specifically to help club/private teams with charitable donations. Take a look at http://yellowstonerobotics.org/. Public school teams usually have donations made to the schools, and most donors treat public schools as equivalent to 501©(3) organizations for this purpose.
I go and schedule meetings with companies to get sponsorship so I would try that. Go call whoever you can that will help you set up one. It pays off to be face to face
The problem over here is that VEX isn’t as big of a thing as it is in America. So we have to go to extra effort to explain how big it really is.
@NattyMan0007 Yea no, no one gives a flying (word for fecal matter) about vex here either. You just have to explain. Luckily our sponsor had watched the movie Spare Parts, so Vex was easier to explain. But really, if they want to know what type of group they’re giving a sponsorship to, just tell them you’re a sports team. You can officially tell the truth in Texas, but by my logic Vex is pretty much a physical eSport = sport so that should be acceptable.