I have a friend who has a home based business and she just offered to do an in-school sale to raise funds for a special project. She is offering all of her profits toward the project, so she is gaining nothing. If that's what the parent is offering, then I say go for it. If however, she will be receiving financial gain through this fundraiser, then I would be a bit uncomfortable with it and would probably be more likely to offer some kind of opportunity where all the interested parents with homebased businesses could participate like a vendor fair.

There is a mom is our school who would be willing to hold a school wide Silpada party. She told the principal that she would make a donation to the school's HSA (our PTA). As the Ways & Means person for the school it would not be much on my part. The President is a bit hesitant-we have other parents with home based businesses, would we be favoring 1 vs another-some people might have just gone to one of these parties.

My feeling is neutral. If someone is willing to donate to the school's HSA why should we not take advantage of this? Are there other arguments that I am not looking at?