I know no one loves fundraising! But I am wondering, have there been any that you actually liked? Where any very profitable? Next year is my daughters "big fundraising" year, we need a good one! (Thank you!)
Whatever you do, do something useful. Like wrapping paper. Mabel's Labels has a paperless fundraiser (kids lose stuff!). I don't like fundraisers like selling fruit or cookies because I usually don't need the quantities. Something that can be ordered online makes it easy to ask friends and family to participate.
I agree with the race ("fun run"). It makes a lot of money.
Also, we usually have a carnival and sell tickets - the kids spend on cake walks, games, etc.
Plant sales
parking lot sale (like a big garage sale with donated items)
Here's an idea - schedule your fundraiser for a time that your state legislature is in session. Then take the kids on a field trip to the capital to visit the house and senate office building. Have them bring their fundraising materials with them, and hit up every elected official they see. Also make sure to visit your school board and city or county governments. If they complain, explain that due to their decisions on school funding, such activities are regrettably necessary. I think that if every school in the state did this for a year or two, school funding might improve dramatically. :-)
My favorite one is probably dine and donate: every month we arrange a different restaurant. We print flyers; people take them in that night and the restaurant gives 20% of everyone's bill who brought in the flyers to the school.
My other favorites are ones where we sell something that people are going to buy anyway. Bulbs in the fall, glow necklaces for Halloween, turkeys for Thanksgiving, wreaths at the holidays, Valentine's day cards, seeds in the spring.
Another one I want to do is to a kite festival.
Heads or tails raffle is fun at another event, like a carnival.
Here is a list of ideas also: http://www.fundraising-ideas.org/DIY/
How much money do you need?
I don't do them. I don't need fruit baskets, cookies, personalized plastic doodads or wrapping paper. If a school really needs something, they should add it to the school budget or consider floating a bond. I would personally rather write a check for a specific activity than buy a lot of whatever it is the school is selling.
I HATE the fundraisers where you or your kids have to sell a product. My favorite fundraiser is a fun run my son's school does. They send home 10 envelopes and form letters asking people to pledge $ for the child doing the running/walking. Your child fills them out and you send them back to the school. The PTO pays for stamps and mails them all off. Basically you send them to grandmas, grandpas, family members, and even local businesses (my son's dentist and the local pizza place always donate to him each year). They hold the fun run on a specific day...your kid gets exercise and has fun. That's it! 100% of the profit goes to the school. They make a TON of money on this each year.
For 13 years I did a walkathon at my school. Each year it brought in about $50kfor our school (about 250-300 kids participating).
The 2 schools that my son has attended both do silent auctions/formal dinners. One does a different theme every year, the other does a Kentucky Derby theme. It is a TON of work, but they pull in something like $80-100k.
His current school also does a "fun run" and carnival each September.
How about Scrips? Does your school participate? (basically, parents buy gift cards for commonly shopped places and the school gets a certain percentage of the sales.) It is a big fundraiser at both of the private schools my son has attended.
Have a mini "marathon" at the school.
Parents "sponsor" their child.
Monetary donations.
Not selling, or making anything.
Ya know how the American Heart Association has those "Jump Rope For Heart events at school???
Well, its easy and fun and earns a lot of $$ for the organization.
Well, a school can do a similar thing.
And the kids get prizes or by grade level.
And then NO one, has to make or sell anything.
It is purely, monetary donations for the fun-run.
I find service based fundraisers are the most profitable and time efficient. Things like car washes or a gift wrapping table at the mall around the holidays. Other good fundraisers I've been a part of are Pet of the Month calendars (people pay $50-$100 to have their pet featured, a professional photographer donates her time, and a $2 production cost calendar gets sold for $15.) The HS choir sold big purple bows for $20 to hang outside the home showing support of the music program. I've never been so happy to shell out $20 and not have to deal with a bucket of cookie dough that I know the school got little profit on. The band and choir also did a raffle for a timeshare stay that someone donated.
Our PTO sells trash bags, Market Day food, tshirts and dog tags, McTeacher night at McDonalds (every other year), Script (gift cards and we get a certain % of the cost), Original Artworks and a few other things each year. The catalogs do not go over well within our district no matter if they are cookies, pizza, wrapping paper or just misc stuff.
My two older kid's class put on a play as their big eighth grade fundraiser. The cool thing about it was it made amazing memories but also they did it all themselves.
Well most of it, the big money came from the ad book but it was kind of cool to buy your kid a whole page if they had major roles, grandparents got it, local businesses. It has been a while but if I remember correctly it netted over two thousand dollars per play.
helpourschool.com
It's a discount card that is essentially and entertainment book. Your school also gets school supplies through it.
Our fourth graders sell cards that give discounts to local stores and restaurants. The cards fit in an ID case and are reusable at your favorites. Examples, three free when you buy four soft pretzels, free matching sandwich at many chains like McDonalds, $1 off any order at a local pizza place, buy one get one at many chains in the food court. This is how their five day camping trip in fifth grade only costs each family about $100.
Players' Choice Fundraising 888 266 9202
I like dine and donate, walk-a-thon, flower sale, craft fair, and clothing sale. I'm not a huge fan of entertainment books, cookie dough or cheesecake sales.
The flower and clothing sales did bring in significant amounts of money, but they are also a ton of work. We had our first jr. high walk-a-thon last year. Only twelve kids participated, but they raised over $500! We'll only get more participants and will raise more money in the years to come.
Good luck!
Our school does Joe Corbi's, Yankee Candles, Dine to Donate, and other small ones. We don't participate in the school ones because my daughter has them for dance and we have to do those to offset the insane cost of competitive dance.
Her big sellers are Joe Corbi's and raffle tickets (for a cash prize). They also do Thirty-One, Pampered Chef, Tastefully Simple (another big one), Damsel in Defense, Origami Owl, Lia Sophia, etc.
HATE them.
We are FINALLY done with all the cheer fundraisers. We were expected to raise a minimum of $5000 each through selling advertising for the football program, spirit wear, etc. and if you didn't sell your "portion", you pay the difference.
The football boosters have a golf tournament, dinner and silent auction. Last year they raised about $75,000 with this event alone.
The PTA has a write a check campaign and works alongside the other sport booster clubs. We have a large school (grades 11-12 only) and the running numbers for the PTA is around $200,000. The do a lot of great things for the students, especially the prom and after prom
My fundraiser of choice is the write a check campaign. I much prefer to do that than purchase things I don't want or need. My second choice is the silent auction because around here there are some great things offered that are big ticket items.
Good luck.
ETA: One thig our boosters do add.... IF someone does not want to participate in the cookie sales, or whatever the item is, we offer a buyout. Say it is expected to sell 20 packages of cookie dough at $14 each... you can buy out at $140 which would be the total profit of the 20 packages to the specific booster club or PTA.
I'm on PTO and I've been the fundraising chair for two years. I hate fundraisers. :-D Without them though, we would not be able to provide school services.
We've tried skipping sales fundraisers in favor of asking for checks/cash. Epic fail. Even though people complain about fundraisers and say they would rather write a check and be done with it, when that offer is on the table they don't write one.
We've tried various things to appeal to our families. Using local businesses, sustainable products, popular foods....we've customized prizes instead of giving out junky stuff.
The best performing fundraiser at our school is still the catalog of random things with silly/junk prizes.
School Fair - some friday night in the spring with bounce house, food, and games run by parent/teacher/older kid volunteers, auction, etc.
Give Back night - partner with local restaurants and every other month have a give back night - bring a coupon into the restaraunt on a wednesday and 10% of the meal cost goes to the school. Easy and you don't have to go door to door selling things.
Our old school did Race for Education. The kids all brought in names of people and there were letters that they sent out asking them to sponsor them. Then they all went out to track for an afternoon run/walk. Got them moving and there was no pressure on people to buy things they didnt want. We don't know who contributed ( it was anonymous) and the donations were tax deductible. The school did well. Our new school's most popular are Rita's where the teachers serve during different times and sweet frog battle of the schools (the school that has the most people buy gets to keep the most money.
