Metzy, what grades and how many students do you work with? Can you tell me how much capital you raised during your most sucessful campaign, I am curious. I like your ideas.
Our group runs their fall fundraiser with a full prize program. It is a catalog sale with a built-in prize program. The vendor pays for everything, from printing to delivering, from prizes to assemblies. Kids are definately pumped up for the prizes. It makes for a very easily run fundraiser.
On the other hand, I run several fundraisers for the school general fund itself. I do not use a prize program, opting instead for a raffle program with perhaps 5 'big' prizes (mini tv, mini fridge, giant stuffed spongebob, etc.), maybe 25 small prizes (anything and everything I can get vendors to donate... usually left overs in their warehouses from prize programs...lol... this year I also gave out twenty five .50 coupons that could be used in our Santa Shop, three $1 coupon and one $5 coupon for more than 50 raffle prizes). Top salesmen in each hall (k-3 and 4-6) won $25 shoppers cards from Walmart and/or Kmart. Top classroom in each hall won a pizza and ice cream party. It didn't cost the school a dime and I will tell you that the kids were just as motivated as they were with the full prize program during catalog sales. Maybe more so because each morning I was in the hallways with encouragement and an extra 'ummph' when and where needed.
I think it is how you excite the kids that really makes a difference. Your prizes have to be good, but a full prize program is not necessary. If you forgo the prize program, companies will usually up your profit line by as much as 15%, making a 50% with a prize program into a 65% with prizes being donated from the vendor as well as other sources.
Please allow me to attempt to answer some of your questions. For the % agreed upon 50% can be good,however 50% with a poor prize program can be bad. I always suggest that any school interested in fund rasing should consider what programs the vendor offers to motivate the students to sell.
Who pays for the prizes, the school or the vendor? If the school pays, is it retail cost or whole sale cost? If the vendor pays all costs yet offers a solid prize program, a 60%-40% split might raise more money than a 50%-50% would. It completely depends on the incentives. If little Johnny only gets to throw his name in a hat to win a prize as opposed to an accumlative prize program, how motivated is he?
a lot of the percentage of profit for the school depends on how well the sales do. We take a lower profit percentage if the sales are high. We did a candle fundraiser that we completed just a bit ago and with less than 30% of a small school participating (enrollment is 175) we still cleared over $3000 with a minimum of effort. Some fundraisers take more time for the profit than others. Take a rummage sale, that is a low output in cost but high in time and the income is 100% of what is taken in unless you provide drinks/snacks in which the cost of the items still bring in profit.
It is a hard road to choose which is better. We tend to do a variety and hope that the community takes as much atvantage of what we offer as we can get them to take. We are a small "city" in an isolated part of the state, so we have to be VERY careful about how to go about the sales end and not hit up the same people over and over for money.
flmom--if you don't mind me asking, what company was this for? They definitely know how to keep their customers happy and coming back!
We too are looking for fundraisers, especially ones where we don't have to hit on the parents too much (we have a LOT of fundraising going on in our school for various things). We'll be using Kash for Kids for recycling, and plan on doing a lot of letter and grant writing.
I think that 50% should be the norm. I also think it is perfectly acceptable to only get 40%. I think it should be product that you know will sell. I think you should have multiple choices when it comes to selling anything.
Here is what makes the difference, at least to me. When 'interviewing' different vendors, take into consideration all the above mentioned things (brochures, forms, prizes, etc. that the vendor will/will not provide). You will probably find they are very competitive in what they can do for you. The difference for me is that I know I AM DOING THEM A FAVOR BY USING THEIR COMPANY, not the other way around. As long as you keep this in mind when researching and then interviewing vendors, you should be able to 'bump em up' from say, 40% to 45%, or from 50% to 55%. You could also do products where you set your own price, like I do with cookie dough or a Santa Shop. I like that I have a cost per product (lowest available cuz I AM DOING THEM A FAVOR BY USING THEIR COMPANY, not the other way around...lol) and can determine my own price. For instance, say the vendor says the cookie dough will cost you $5.55 a tub. You can decide to sell it for $10, $11, $12 or whatever, therefore determining your own profit margin. My vendor then prints up the brochures according to my specifications. It's just one way to go.
My point is this: You are doing them a favor by using their company. They are providing a service FOR YOU. There are too many companies out there trying to get your business for you to settle without at least trying to up your profit, your service, whatever. Explain to them right up front that you are interviewing several different companies and will make your decision based on the outcome of all interviews. Best Company Wins. You may be surprised to see how they compete for your business by lowering their profit margin and giving you a bigger piece of the pie.
