School Fundraising Ideas

School Fundraising Ideas

Okay, so you’re on the PTA Board and you’ve volunteered to be in charge of fundraising. The first question that comes to my mind is “What were you thinking?!”

There are dozens of profitable fundraisers available to schools, and hundreds of unprofitable, labor-intensive fundraisers. One of the first things you need to do is to separate out the good from the bad.

Your fundraising campaign can’t get by with just one fundraiser, and you don’t have time to run more than 4 or 5, so how do you thin the herd?

First, try to avoid those labor-intensive fundraisers that need tons of pre-planning and dozens of volunteers. I’m talking about car washes, bake sales and similar events. Sure, you can make a few hundred dollars with a car wash, but think of all the upfront work:

• Getting commitments from 10-15 “car washers”
• Printing flyers and publicizing the car wash (plan on posting flyers on about 50 light posts or telephone poles)
• Finding a business location with enough “drive by” traffic to attract customers (you might need to ask as many as 10 businesses before you find someone who will say Okay).
• Buying supplies (special car wash soap, buckets, hoses, sponges, etc.)
• Feeding your hard-working team lunch (you’re going to be there all day).
• Cleaning up the location (after the last car, you will need to pick up trash, etc.)
• Taking down all those flyers (the city doesn’t want you to leave them).

Now you just subtract the cost of supplies and lunch ($100?) from the money you took in ($175?) and you have a $75 profit. Now throw that into the general fund.

You can expect the same amount of work and same profit from that bake sale you were considering.

Here’s an alternative… a car magnet fundraiser. Sure, it might take a little more upfront money. 250 custom car magnets from ARC Marketing will cost about $500, but your going to sell those 250 magnets for $6 each. That’s $1,500 in sales, minus $500 in product cost, and you have a $1,000 profit. It would take more than a dozen car washes to equal that.

And with a car magnet fundraiser you don’t need to coordinate any labor, print and post any flyers, find a location to have the fundraiser, buy any supplies, feed your team, clean up afterwards.

Getting started on your car magnet fundraiser is easy. You just call ARC Marketing (760-743-6340) and we’ll take care of everything… design, print and ship your magnets to your door. You can also visit our website at www.arcmktg.com.