School Fundraising

E

earlyexerciser

Cathlete
Does anyone have any suggestions as to what you have experienced as a good fundraiser for an elementary school?

Our PTO is looking at changing the fundraiser and I am looking for some suggestions.

Please start another thread if you would like to discuss the positives/negatives to fundraising:) !!! I am just looking to see if anyone has experienced some good products:)

We have been doing the giftwrap, chocolates and cheeses/spreads.
Jenn
 
If you are doing a spring fundraiser, how about flowers? I work in a school and I remember one of the groups selling hanging baskets. They worked with a local greenhouse and were able to purchase vouchers and we could go and pick out our own.
 
I'm the NEW PTA PResident for next school year (YEAH!) and in the past, here are a few things we've sold:

*t-shirts with our logo on it
*water bottles with our logo
*Spaghetti Dinner (had this one last night)

Here are a few NEW ideas I'm tossing around for next year:
*Pampered Chef
*organizing a 5K race
*flowers for the Spring

I'll be interested to hear what everybody else has to say, also!

Gayle
 
I love the 5K race idea! I'm on our school's PTO-not a board member, but an active volunteer as well as being on our "Wellness Committee". I'm always looking at new ideas that don't involve eating, selling really unhealthy food, etc. Gayle can you pm me the details if you do go through with the 5K? I'd love to bring it up at our next meeting.

We do different things to raise money throughout the year. We have a big fundraiser in the fall selling wrapping paper, gifts, etc. We also have Spring Carnival that we sell tickets to. There's carnival games with prizes for everyone, a clow who makes balloon animals, an airbrush tattoo artist. For eats there's pizza, nachos, pop. We also have a cakewalk-the kids LOVE this and we have donated themed gift baskets that we raffle off. It's always a big success. We've hosted a fall Harvest Festival with a chili cook off that contestants pay to enter. We also have monthly "Family Night Out" at various restaurants who donate a portion of their sales to our school. And we participate in a program with our local Kroger grocery chain that involves loading up money on a Kroger debit card. For everyone who does that, we get a kickback every month-it's like getting free money! It's awesome! We just got done with our Spring Book Fair. Whew! Hope that helps!

Klaudia
 
I used to be on the fundraising comittee for my kids previous school. We had a yearly fundraiser which was a themed party (i.e. Oscar Night, 60s, Hawaian, etc.). Parents would pay $ 50 per person, food was provided and we had a silent auction. Items for the silent auction were donated from local businesses and through corporate sponsorships.

There also was a live-auction with a local TV personality as the MC where items were auctioned to the highest bidder, i.e. items that each classroom made, like quilts with a picture of each child on one of the squares, tiled flower pots, baskets with BBQ items, games. Some of the parents were Arizona Diamondback and Cardinals players, they donated jerseys, signed baseballs, sports items, etc, some were personal chefs, owned a flight school or had connections to other "desirable" items or services, which were also auctioned through the MC.

It was quite involved and required a lot of legwork, a lot of approaching local businesses, parents and sponsors. But in the 4 years I was involved in that, we went from $ 30k (net after all expenses) the first year to $ 75k in the fourth year.

It was very effective BUT it is VERY involved, including myself there were 5 people on the committee and we had about 15 volunteers when it came to putting it all together and for the last 4 or 5 days we were working until the wee hours.

We had also worked with a local dealership to get a new car that was raffled off, one ticket was $ 50 or $ 100, I think the net profit was somewhere around $ 12k.

At my kids current, public school, there is a yearly fundraiser also with a silent auction but not to the extent that the previous school was doing and the proceeds are usually a couple of thousand $$.

Then there is also eSripps where parents (or anyone else) link their grocery card or Target to a specific school and a percentage will be donated to the specified school. I think Amazon.com also has a program where you can put their link on your school website and a percentage of each sale that comes through that link will be donated to the school.

I hope this helps. Good luck with the fundraising!
 
At my daughter's elementary school, they did a "Walk-a-thon". The kids walked laps and collected money per lap or a straight fee - which ever the payer wanted. During it they held silent auctions and worked with the local pizza places to sell pizza and have parts of the proceeds to go to the school. They also had games and prizes. Parents volunteered and it was always a good time. We held it in October - but we live in California, so it's pretty warm all year round.
 
We also do a walkathon. We started it last year and were pretty successful. We only had a participation "prize", which was for everyone regardless of if they raised $$ or not. We wanted to keep costs way low, which we did. The participation prize was a lanyard with our school logo and everyone got a water bottle. The students walk a path around our school for 45 minutes. We play music and make it a fun day (walk different silly walks and just have fun!). The walkathon is a very easy fun fundraiser!!

In the past 50% of our parents have said that they want "stuff" for their money. The other 50% said that they wanted to just give $$ to the school. This is why we do a walkathon in the spring and the "stuff" fundraiser in the fall (the one that we are looking at changing).

Thanks for the great ideas!!!!!
Jenn
 
How about collecting old used cell phones and empty inkjet cartridges and sending them into a recycling company for cash? This can be a very successful program - especially with hundreds of kids and parents working at it. I did this (single-handedly) to raise money when I did Team In Training, and the more people you have doing it, the better it works. It's great because nobody has to BUY anything - it costs people nothing to donate old, unused things. Plus, it's helping the environment by keeping this junk out of the landfills. I went through Ecophones and they were really good.

http://www.ecophones.com/default.aspx

Example letter that students can distribute:
http://www.ecophones.com/Schools.aspx
 
My DS's school did an auction and silent auction recently. They raised $10,000. They got each class to put together a themed basket. Our class's basket was "eat out night" and included giftcards from local restaurants. Other baskets included, "family night out," "Hannah Montanna stuff," "Legos," "Books," Dog items, art supplies, coffee fanatic, chocolate fanatic, Christmas stuff, etc. Local businesses also donated services and items for the silent auction. It was fun. The school got a local auctioneer to mc the event, and the baskets went for A LOT of money.

They also do a pancake breakfast with Santa at Christmas at our local Applebees. The teachers and some of the 5th grade students at the school are the cooks/servers. The Applebees manager just lets the school use the restaurant and all of the proceeds go to the school. That was very very fun. I think that they charge $5 a plate.

The school doesn't do fundraisers that involve any door-to-door type of sales. Instead they urge the parents to join the PTO at the beginning of the year for $5 or become a "Friend" of the school for $50 (which many parents do). It's really a good deal, considering if DS sold stuff, I'd wind up spending A LOT more.
 
Hello,
At our school we are having lots of success with an online fundraiser we found at
www.Smartraise.com

Its a website that has over 200 stores associated with it such as, Target, Walmart, Sears, Staples...... you register your group or school and then ask parents and teachers to stop at the smartraise website. From the website, the shoppers are directly linked to the stores they would normally be shopping at. Each store as contracted a different percentage of purchase that goes back to your group. When the group is ready the advisor clicks a button and the group gets a check sent to them . No order forms, no candy, no lost order slips. You just have to remember to remind your supporters to shop!
 
Wow, nothing real different when my kids were in school than has already been discussed.

Along the same lines as the stores, we sold "scrip" through our local grocery store Safeway. The school got 5% for the $ sold and we all needed to grocery shop. When we started we had volunteers that would even deliver to the parents or meet them somewhere in order to make it a "no brainer".

We had quite a few of the franchise eateries who would designate a fundraiser night and all who presented a coupon that night would have a portion of their meal donated to the school. When we did it a Burger King, they actually let our teachers and other administrators serve the meals to the tables. The kids loved being "served" by the teachers and administrators:D

Something that was fun that we did for our Arts Alive program were plates and t-shirts that used the children's artwork to be put onto the item. They made excellent gifts for Mother's day, Father's day, Xmas, etc. What parent, grandparent doesn't like their grand/children's artwork to display, eat off of or wear? Actually, my kids loved eating off the plates they made themselves !
 
You all are so awesome!! I have been thinking and thinking of new things to try and it dawned on me how many parents are right here!! Your ideas are great! I am planning on printing off the ideas generated and bringing to our next meeting!

Thank you so much!!
Jenn
 
Jenn,
My husband and I have been to "crazy bowl" fundraisers that are a blast. It's just bowling, but each frame has a different fun thing to do, like bowl with your "opposite" hand, bowl between your partner's legs, etc. Lots of fun!
Paula
 
I don't have kids, and I'm not involved in the PTO, but I live in a neighborhood with approximately 5982 kids selling stuff for school -- lol! I, for one, am really tired of the whole candy/gift wrap thing, but I love some of the ideas that have been presented here. I'd buy a plant in a heartbeat. I also love Emily's idea for collecting and recycling old cell phones and inkjet cartridges.
 
I have just finshed putting both my girls through 6 years each of elementary school and have experienced a wide range of fund raising activities.

There were some that were universally appealing and very successful and others that I hated and boycotted.

I hated the expensive gift wrap catalogs that the kids were supposed to sell to friends and relatives. It encourages waste, none of it was recycled and I couldn't afford the prices. I also loated the ones that got the kids to sell unhealthy foods to their friends and family, fat-laden desserts, and all sorts of crappy foods that no-one should be eating. So, I was against those on principle.

I supported the Spring plant ales for a couple of years, then had to stop. If you follow this route, you must make sure your supplier is giving you high quality plants. I would spend $30 on bedding plants only to have the whole lot fail to thrive. But the plants I replaced them with and had purchased a local garden centre sale thrived. So, I resented having felt like I had gotten a pig-in-a-poke.

Here are the ideas that worked and were loved:

1. Winter carnival.

It was so good to have an idea that got nearly thw whole school to come out in freezing Michigan winter to come and have several hours of fun. And people always came in droves! Parking was at a premium! It included stacks of fun games, easily played inside, little presents that were rubbish really but the kids love them! A cake walk (parents donated the baked goods), and food for sale (hot dogs, pizza, sodas, juices, etc)

2. Ice cream social in June, last week of school.

Similar to Winter carnival in terms of food for sale, and games, but games could be bigger and take up more space because played outside. It alo included ice cream, and a dunk tank where some teachers took turns waiting to be dunked if the kids threw the ball and hit the buzer. These teachers were always good sports and this one game drew the crowds from home. Who wouldn't want to see their principal in shorts and wet tee, especially if he hoses the crowd back with his water pistol!!

3. Scholastic Book Fair.

This one is always hosted in the run up to Christmas, allowing parents to get new books at discount as presents for their kids, school always gets part of the proceeds. I helped out with this every year and loved it. Who wouldn't want to promote reading while raising money for the school?

4. Movie nights.

Every so often, we would gather in the main hall, bring a blanket for the family, buy a pizza for the whole family and watch a movie with friends from the school. All goof family entertainment on a bigger screen.


Generally speaking I am against fundraisers that require kids to beg family and relatives to keep buying crappy, over-priced stuff from them. I don't want others sighing when they see my kids at their door toting a glossy catalog. It gets old real quick. Neither do I want them knocking on strangers' doors. Not in today's world thank you.

So, from a parent's perspective, this is what works and what doesn't.

Clare
 
Clare~ I am with you on your post!! We have been doing the carnival (in winter, in MI!!), but the company that "supplied" the games for us charged us almost as much as we took in during the carnival. This was the first year that I was involved and I was shocked that we didn't have pure profit for games with the little prizes that you mentioned. This is part of the reason that we are looking at switching our fundraising.

We are now looking at making up our own games, like you suggested and going to more profit from the carnival next year. Lesson learned!!

How did you make money on your movie night. We do this now, but we just pay the $75 movie license and it is a free event for our parents.

We also do a field day in June similar to what you mentioned, but right now it is free for the students, during the school day. Families are encouraged to join us, but this is also not a money maker, but something we spend money on as a PTO.

We do the Scholastic Book Fair and LOVE it! We usually do pretty well and put lots of books in the hands of lots of students, as well as many for our library!

Thanks for the ideas, Clare! You have given me several to think about!!
Jenn
 
There's a lot of really creative ideas in this thread.

I don't have kids so don't have any PTO involvement, but I know charity golf tournaments are pretty popular around here. I've participated in several as a participant.
 
our school doesn't do any selling out of catalogs or things like that but their main fundraiser comes from their yearly carnival/silent auction. a lot of it depends on donations and participations of students and parents as well(lots of local businesses put services and products up for auction as well). the schools used to work with a thrift store that donated to city schools but they closed up :-(.

however our scouts are doing magazines(the tripod link below is our special needs troops)online as well as having another yard sale. i know many ppl probably have stuff they would like to get rid of and what a way to help out by donating items for a big yard sale and all funds go to the school. our last go at it made us nearly $400 that went towards a trip to VA Beach Aquarium for the kids.


kassia

http://www.picturetrail.com/ldy_solana

http://jtjulian2003.tripod.com

YOU CAN'T HAVE EVERYTHING,WHERE WOULD YOU PUT IT??
<IMG SRC="http://pic20.picturetrail.com/VOL1307/4842454/16585805/255246443.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrai
 
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