For the past 6 or so years we have used Santa's Secret Shop (Fun Services), which has been ok, but I have to tell you as parents, we felt like the merchandise was poor quality. At the PTA convention this year we found Reindeer Lane. We were really impressed with their merchandise. The girl who usually runs the shop was really angry that we switched, since she is friends with the local Santas Shop rep, but we feel it is worth the change (at least so far). The rep here has been awesome, we are a Title 1 school with 350 students, he has agreed to give EVERY student a 50 cent voucher so that everyone can participate. (we dont mark up the items, it is just for fun with us) PLUS he agreed to give extras so we can give them to the more needy students. (Actually they will "win" them in a drawing, but we feel these kids need an extra boost of confidence). Another great thing is there is no inventory for us to worry about, if we have some items walk away unaccounted for, they take the cut, not us. I am really looking forward to this years shop. We are also considering doing something I have seen at another school we used to go to, where the 6th graders run the shop. This way they learn the process of sales, inventory, money exchange (with supervision of course) and helping the younger kids to shop. We havent decided if that part will happen yet or not, but it seems like a fun idea, even if we only do it for a day. Wish us luck!
I hope this helps.

We've used Jingle Bell Shop (which I don't recommend) and Kids Go Shopping (which I highly recommend).

Most shops have an online site so that you can view the gifts and products you will be selling. If you start calling now, you can probably get each to send you a few items (your pick or they will just send their best stuff...lol...) so that you can see the quality. Whoever you go with, you need to make sure of the quality. With Jingle Bell Shop, we had an enormous amount of returns due to breakage (one example: pens bought for teachers cost like $1.50 and broke during first time usage - all of them!). With Kids Go Shopping, we had NO returns at all, no complaints on the price or quality of the items, etc.

The other thing to make sure of is that they carry several .25 items (of reasonable quality and quantity). Keep these near the register.

Whether you are doing this to make money or as a 'good deed' service, you should be prepared for what can turn out to be quite a bit of work. We did our first one as a fundraiser and did indeed make money ($3000+). Last year we did it as a 'good deed' service and still made $1000+ (we only marked things up to increments of .25 - if we paid .15, we charged .25 - if we paid .25 there was no mark up at all). We feel better about having done it as a service to our school... it made the hard work worth it whereas doing for profit did not give us as good a feeling.

Regarding purchasing and reselling items yourself, you have to be really careful. You may over-purchase items that don't end up selling and you may under-buy items and end up not having enough. With an established company, you get overnight service of any thing you run out of and you get to send anything that didn't sell back. So becareful of purchasing 200 one dollar rings that don't sell or only purchasing 200 one dollar rings that everyone wants to buy and you can't get any more of.

Good Luck!

[ 08-29-2004, 09:29 PM: Message edited by: TheMetzyMom ]

We have used Reindeer Lane two years in a row, but not anymore. We had a 20% mark up and during one day of our sale (during a craft fair) we sold $2500.00 worth of product but our share of that was only $500.00. We decided right then it wasn't worth it. So this year a mom who loves to shop has been hitting clearance sales etc for our products. She has hit some remarkable sales. Even if we mark up 50% parents will get an excellent deal. Because of booking issues we will not have our sale until 12/12. Parents are already disappointed because they know they can get a lot of shopping done for next to nothing with our new format. We have since had to make it very clear, that parents will NOT be allowed to shop until the entire school has shopped. We are afraid the parents will buy us out and there won't be anything left the children to purchase.

I sale will be MUCH more profitable for us and the parents will actually get items they like.

Good Luck with your sale.

PTA Renegade

I am in the NE Ohio area and I am very interested in learning more about how you ran your Santa Shop. We are, unfortunately committed this year to a Santa Shop company. This is our first year at doing a Santa Shop but I would be very interested in a different approach for next year.

Email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Thanks.

PTA Renegade, I would love to have any information you could share about the santa store ideas. THANKS, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Hi! I've been away for a couple months (but did receive a top City PTA award while I was gone!!), and I noticed that this thread was bumped up from the bottom.

I never had a chance to update this thread with the results of our do-it-yourself style Santa Shop, but after reading the crazed post above this one I thought that a more moderate opinion was in order. Here we go:

Our Santa Shop was held over 2 days in early December. (We are a 100% free lunch, Title I School.) We had a total of 85 unique gift items, plus a full-size Scholastic Books Warehouse Sale (Hey, books make great gifts too!). Items were purchased from both local and national stores and wholesalers. We maintained total control over the quality of the goods, as well as their price. Average markup was 50%, more if we got a bargain on the item, but NO item was priced over $3.50 (lets see a santa shop company do that!).

Instead of heaping the tables with goods (too disorganized), we placed one of each of the items on the tables, grouped according to the recipient (kids, men's, women's, misc) along with a note card with the description, price and item #.

The students were issued in advance an gift list including all 85 items. They brought their list and their $$ to the Shop, chose their items, noted them on their sheet, shopped for books then hit the checkout. The orders were bagged up and sent directly to the classrooms by the end of the day. We also held a "family night" and sold thirty 20pc stoneware dish sets for $3.50 each as an enticement - they were gone in an hour!

Here's the bottom line:
Gross Sales $4000 (400 students in school)
Net Profit $1200 (After ALL expenses, including my gas, lunch daily for Shop Workers, Free Items for Students in need, $200 in Books for library)

5 Hours per day
2-3 PTA Volunteers/Day (5th Graders volunteered as well to help K/1st Grade)

Items Sold: 1925

Parent Feedback: 100% Positive, 2 letters to the school board praising the sale, etc. 0% Dissatisfied Students/Parents.

Most Popular Items:
Mens's/Women's Watches $3.50 (we paid $4.48, but what the heck),
Giant-Size Kellogg's Cereal Bowl w/ matching spoons $3.50
Basketballs $3.50.

CONCLUSION: We will do the Santa Shop in the same way next year, but add opportunites for the students to get involved by making more of the gifts at after-school craft parties (pouring candles, making jewelry, etc). We might bump up the maximum price to $4.50 just to include a few more items (better perfume, walkmans, legos). We had 4 Storage Tubs of merchandise left over which was used at the Silent Auction, Spring Fling, Teacher Appreciation; We also had a teachers-only "yard sale" one morning and let them buy leftovers at cost for their student reward boxes. There was no damaged items, no returns, wonderful!

I will provide more info on our shop to anyone that emails me to request, and I am also looking for a few schools (NE Ohio/NW PA) that might want to band together and buy in bulk. We could have made another $1000 if we had gotten together with other schools and used the same list. Email if interested. Sorry so long, thanks for reading!!

[ 05-25-2004, 11:31 PM: Message edited by: PTA Renegade ]