I organize a pizza dinner at our school every year in concert with our annual Talent Show. Performers eat free---adults pay $6, 12 and under children pay $3, and children two and under eat free. Dinner includes pizza, green salad with choice of dressings (purchased from Costco or Sam's), layer cake (purchased from Costco or Sam's), coffee, raspberry iced tea (no caffeine) and lemonade. Where else can you get a meal like this for $6? NO ONE has ever complained about the cost.

Pizza Hut DONATES the pizzas for the performers (between 50 and 75 students) and we purchase the remainder.

We send flyers/order forms home and sell tickets in the office beginning two weeks before the event. We keep a list of EVERYONE who purchases tickets because, invariably, the filled ticket order envelopes never make it home. (I alphabetize the list so the ticket-taker isn't shuffling papers at the door.) The event is held on Friday evening and ticket sales close at 10 a.m. on Thursday. This gives us enough time to determine how many pizzas to order and how much salad/cake to purchase.

We set up four six-foot tables and cover them with plastic cloths. A separate table, away from the "serving line," is set up for self-serve beverages.

The cafeteria loans us its portable warming oven---which is a wonderful thing. This is set up at the head of the serving line. Plates, napkins and plastic cutlery are set at the beginning of the serving line. Servers (wearing plastic gloves!) stand on one side of the tables, guests move down the other. Servers (often fifth graders) ask guests whether they want pepperoni or cheese and and place two slices on adults' plates---one slice on children's plates. Salad is presented in large bowls and guests serve and dress the salads themselves. Cakes are pre-cut and placed on small dessert plates and placed at the end of the serving line.

(Note: As each pizza box is emptied, the servers stash it under the table until serving is completed, replacing it with a fresh pizza from the warmer.)

We generally serve between 250 to 300 people and have clean up competed in one hour---important because the cafeteria is also the theater! (Dinner begins at six, show starts at seven). This event usually only raises $150 to $200, but its purpose is a social event, not a fundraiser.

[ 08-09-2002: Message edited by: TucsonMom ]</p>

Why not offer an old fashion picnic on the ground type thing. Everyone bring a cover dish. Play it up big come get to know your school family, we'll be a family a long time type thing. Or an icecream social. Have several bring ice cream churns.

Thanks for your replies. I just wanted to clear up a few things. Our PTO is in a big downswing. I am the only elected officer (Pres.) to take an office. Our Sec. was nominated but hasn't been voted in yet and we have no other officers. We'll have to start the year off with another election before we can even get started. The two years dd has been at the school I've heard mostly negative things about the PTO, how it's just a big fundraiser, nobody listens and most decisions are made without a vote (and we've never done an Executive board and only one committee and that was just the first year I was at this school). These aren't empty complaints. So, our goal is to increase communication and to offer more activities aside from meetings and fundraisers, other chances to get involved in the school. But the money has to come from somewhere and last year at the last meeting they did a flurry of voting to approve last minute purchases that are still being put into place. I still can't get an answer as to how much $$ is still obligated out and what we'll have to start with next year (okay, it's now THIS year, just weeks away). I think that once everyone sees that we are trying to refocus our goals, we will see more people becoming involved. As of now, it's "why bother?". So, we want to bring in new things but we need to have a little security as well, you know? That's why I thought that our PTO might split the cost of the dinner. It wouldn't be a fundraiser at all it would just allow us to have a "Back to School" dinner instead of having to wait until later in the year when we have had a fundraiser and have more of a nest egg. We've gotten lots of feedback from people who would like more done at the beginning of the year, so we liked the idea of the dinner.

These problems are why I'm having difficulty deciding how to handle some things. Like the dinner, we can't afford to buy food for 150 people and have 50 show up. That's why I thought preselling tickets might be a good idea, to get a good start on what to expect. We would probably open it up after a certain time once we had an idea number-wise. I like the idea of color coding the tickets, that would make it much easier to keep up with purchases and to pass that info. onto those handling it next year. We have hardly any information that is being passed on from one year to the next and we want to change that this year. As it is, each year each group is pretty much having to reinvent the wheel.

The pizza idea is a good one but we are heavily sponsored by a local pizza place and we offer pizza parties throughout the year and have a weekly night at the pizza place where we benefit from sales. So, we do pizza quite a bit and I think something else would go over a little better. How much work was the spaghetti dinner? Did you use the school equipment to cook for that volume of people or did several people each make up a batch at home?

Also, donations for the dinner would be harder to come by because we have an Octoberfest (Fall Festival)that is a large income producer for us and we depend heavily on donations for it. We have food, games and a silent auction so we pretty much hit up everybody we can think of by the time it's over with. Most places here don't want to donate multiple times (unless they have a child at the school) because they want to donate to other places as well. So, I hesitate to rely on donations in order to have a Family Night.

Hopefully, after we've made a few changes this year (like by-laws, creating a budget, etc.), next year will be easier to make decisions. This year just has us stumped as to how to get some things done.

Gee, I'm really rambling and I'm sorry. It's just that there are reasons why we are in this predicament but we want to change things without creating a huge bill. If we start spending too heavily then I'm afraid many people will back off. Like I said before, typically we've bought "things" with the PTO's money and even though people want things to change, it will take a while for people to get accustomed to not having "things" to show for their money but having family nights, craft make and takes, teacher appreciation and other things as well.

Thanks for your input
Carrie

We have never charged for our Family nights. This is what fundraising is FOR. We also have had good luck with our local merchants donating food. If you stuff like hot dogs, pizza, soda, many places will donate the food. Ask several pizza places to donate 10 pizzas each; ask your local grocery store or superstore to donate all the plates, forks, cups, etc. Does your PTO have any money to start off with. If not, remember to do that for next year's Board. We have about $5k to start with each year. Its just a courtesy issue. Whatever you have to buy, just take it from your budget (if possible). After finding out how much food will be donated, then maybe ask for a dollar or two. You might also want to put the word out that your sales are not for fundraising, but rather to help pay for your out of pocket expenses.

As far as servers, we always alternate. Have 2 or 3 servers for 30-45 minutes then switch. This has worked for us.

Hope this helps,
Lisa @ Tx

Hi, I have organized a few family dinners for both our K-5th school & my son's pre school!

Once we did pizza and started with 12 large pizzas when we were getting low down to 5 we would call the pizza place and have them deliver more. That way we were never stuck with to many extra, and if we did have 3-5 extra we would sell the whole pizza for $8.00. We also served soda, and bottled water. We had parents bring cupcakes and sold them as a token dessert for cheap! The pizza worked well. Pre organize it with a pizza shop and they will give you a deal. The last time we used a small mom & pop pizza shop and they gave us a great deal, they even provided paper plates and napkins in exchange we let them hang a advertizing banner.
The last 2 times we have done corn dogs and nachos it is really cheap and you can save the extra cheese for next time (buy it in big cans) also the uncooked corn dogs could be kept frozen. frito Lay donated the chip, that was great. And we bought generic sodas. We charged $1.00 corndaog 1.50 nachos & 50 cents for a drink. It was really cheap for the families to eat!!
I want to do a spegetti feed this year. Pasta is cheap, and kids love it!! Stores will donate pasta because it is so cheap, and you can buy the big cans of sause. Serve with bread.
Last year at our OPEN HOUSE we did the corn dog nacho meal and the families loved it, but the few who volunteered did not get to enjoy it with their families. So we decided that this time we will ask a hot dog cart vendor/ or bar bq wagon to come, we won't make any money but will be able to enjoy. I know IN & OUT burger dose a school/fundraiser where they come to your school in their bus and cook/serve.
We never did sell advance tickets for food, I never wanted anyone to not come thinking they did not have a ticket. You can kinda figure out how many will attend. But we did find a great way to sell. Make tickets on your computer- soda- $.50, corn dog $1.00 etc.. photo copy each item/ticket in a different color.. like pink for soda yellow for corn dog. Have one person handle the money they take the money and give the person their tickets for what they ordered. Then they take the ticket to the person who is serving the food. That way you can keep track of what is sold. Good luck!! [img]smile.gif[/img] [img]smile.gif[/img] :confused:

I would like to have several Family Night dinners this next school year. They haven't done anything like this since I've been involved at the school, so I really don't know how they were done the last time they tried it. Anyway, I want to do a Back to School BBQ and a few other events throughout the year. I want it to be geared more towards a social/family/friends time and not necessarily a fundraiser. The thing is that our PTO has basically become a fundraiser the last few years and doesn't do much else. So, when I start adding things that I want to expand our involvement I don't have a "budget" for this area to work with. Sad to say, there is no budget any year. They pretty much raise the money and then decide how to spend it. So, I'm wondering how everyone else handles a dinner. I thought we might charge about half of what our cost would be and then let the PTO cover the other half. We can have it done around $3.60-$3.99 per person, so I thought we might charge $2 a person. That would still be a great deal for dinner and not leave our group with a large part to cover, especially if I want to ease some new programs in without a lot of resistance from people who just want to buy "things". Since we haven't done a dinner lately, I don't have an "average" of attendance from previous years so how can I decide on how much food? Do you pre-sell tickets before the dinner to get a better idea?

Any tips and experience would be appreciated!

Thanks,
Carrie