We did a dinner a couple of years ago where we asked local musical groups to donate their time to perform. We had one top name and a couple of high school groups. Each performed 3-4 songs.

I was talking to a friend of mine about this and he suggested charge a little more and turn it into dinner/comedy night or turn it into a murder mystery dinner.

Wow! What a great idea! How about throwing a cabaret night. Set up your cafeteria like a restaurant and use some of your talented students to entertain the diners. To encourage participation, invite other students to assist by hostessing and waiting tables. The more students you have involved in the event, the higher your turnout will be. Good luck.

raffle off baskets. Like a small tricky tray type event. Around here, dinner and baskets would have them coming out of the woodwork! I've got to check with our Outback, it would be a dream come true for me, dinner and baskets-- I've died and went to heaven!!!

Yes, Outback is a very involved community partner. They provided the meal for our leader appreciation luncheon at $5.00 per person, they have donated the meals for specific school functions and they recently donated meals for the Relay for Life. If they do sell it for $5.00, it is only to cover the cost and the employees donate their time to assist. We are very grateful for our Outback Steakhouse. If the meal is done in the restaurant, it's chicken, steak, garlic mashed potatoes and Ceasar salad. If it's done off site, they don't include the mashed potatoes.
As for luring people back, turn it into a game night or plan a school wide talent show! You'll get plenty of returners!

Thought I would share something I learned today about Outback and fundraising. The Outback in our city (which is partially owned by a parent at our school) sets a budget each year for donating to the community. He told me that he submits his budget to their headquarters and that they build "community" by doing this. He said they don't advertise much locally and this is their way of advertising locally. Told me that their Outback would be willing to donate like 250 dinners to the school and we could sell tickets and make $2500, if we sold tickets for $10. Apparently, they have to turn their 2005 budget in around September, so I would need to let him know when and what we would want to do.

Now, can you creative minds give me some ideas on something we could throw in with this "dinner" that would draw folks back to the school? Many of our families do not live near the school and don't want to drive back in unless they have a good reason.

Just thought I'd share this interesting info. Don't know if it applies across the board but I thought it sounded that way.
Shelly