We sell magazines through American Publishers each spring. Our sales rep, Fun Services, offers many wonderful incentives, one being cash. We have three order turn in days and there are different prizes associated with each day. But there is also a progressive jackpot for those days. On the first day, we put ALL students names into a drawing and pull one out. IF that student turned in even one subscription or renewal, he/she wins $50. If they didn't the pot grows to $100 for the second turn in day. Again, if the name drawn didn't turn in an order, the pot grows to $150 for the third and final turn in.
Also, two of the turn in days have cash prizes. For one, if a student turned in at least 9 subs/renewals, they get to grab a handful of coins from the silver bowl. Lots of nickels, dimes, quarters, and half dollars in there and this year, the rep added gold dollars also. Another cash incentive is the weigh in. If they brought in 9+ subs/renewals, then we weigh them and pay them 10 cents per pound. The kicker is that they get to add to their weight with any inanimate objects they can hold IN their hands. We've had them bring in bowling balls, a backpack weighted with bricks, a portable typewriter. It's great fun.
At our middle school, the PTSA offers the CD players, Gift Cards to music and book stores, etc. That also seems very popular.

Our school recently had a raffle and the top two sellers were given season passes for a family of four to local water parks or Six Flags. We thought season passes for a family of four would be a great incentive for the whole family to get involved selling tickets and the family could enjoy the reward of working & playing together!

Instead of cash, how about gift certificates. Our school is K-8. We have the same issues. This year our fundraisers will be run solely by the PTO and so we have to provide the prizes. My thought is: whether you put them in a drawing or give 1st, 2nd 3rd prizes, you could decide the increments and either choose places like Hastings (that span across the ages) or give them a choice and then purchase the gc later.

I think that $1000 seems like a lot - maybe break that up into several different prizes.

msychel

WHAT WE DID WITH THE MONEY REALLY DID GET OUR PARTICATION UP .SO I GET THE POINT OF DOING CASH INSENTIVES AND IF YOU ARE GOING TO DO THE DRAWING JUST DO NOT HAVE THE CHILD TAKE IT HOME MAKE THE PARENT COME AND PICK IT UP THAT WAY THE MONEY AND THE CHILD ARE SAFE CAUSE WE ALL KNOW HOW SOME KIDS CAN BE.

Thanks for all the input. I know it does sound like a lot of money - but the fundraising company is fronting it - not the school. They usually pay $1200 for a mega party - but only about 30 kids qualified to come to the party.We have 950 students and only had 65 participate this past year. We are trying to come up with ways to increase the participation, therefore increasing the total sale. The company is willing to give us $1200 to be used for a prize program - instead of the mega party.Thanks again.

we did this for our spring fundraiser where if a kids sells ten or items they had a chance to win anywhere from 1 to 20 and they were put in balloons and they popped them they loved it and then to top it of we had a drawing that for every ten items sold they had there name put in a drawing so if they sold 50 items they got thier name put in 5 times and who ever won got a 5 ibs candy bar with 50.00 dollors in it