To solicit for donations you must know who your people are and how you'll be supported. Sometimes you can only make a "guess"timate and learn through trial and error. I know in our area we have a mixture of those that would donate and those that would vehemently oppose it. I can also share that corporate giving in our area is down as well. With those factors in place, I can honestly say that we have seen a decrease in monies. Having done several donation fundraisers I have also found people in our area to be of the opinion that the organization must not be too bad off because we weren't peddling our products. They see donations as "padding".
I personally don't like the catalog sales because profits tend to be low, salesmen target our kids with cheap giveaways, the products are over priced for the quality and quantity and those just name a few. However, if your committed to doing some extra research you can find new companies and/or new products. There are companies out there that offer decent profits and products. It just requires some pretty extensive homework.
Fundraising is an ever changing enviroment. Keep your options open, search for new ideas and products. Hands down people buy from those catalogs for a reason. My belief is that they have a need to have something tangible for their monies. With that said I wish you the best!
Unlike beignet's school, this would not work in our school. The average family is working class and have not been raised to be philanthropic. They would not understand " giving away free money". You also have to consider that for the families that do sell, chances are they are selling at least $50.00 worth of product, and probably netting the school $20 each. Using that logic, if you have the same number of people who participate, then you actually come out ahead.
Tim may be able to address this from a statistics perspective, but I believe I have read that statistically, the odds are that the average school will raise more funds via a fundraiser than asking for just cash. Tim?
I don't know that this will work but it certainly is an interesting thought. Is it possible to get a copy of this letter that you send out to parents? How did you decide how much to ask for and did people give more sometimes? How do you find out about employer/corporate matching programs?
thanks!
What we think, or what we know, or what we believe is, in the end, of little consequence. The only consequence is what we do.<br />
<br> - John Ruskin
we bring in 40k that way, thru parents and corporate matching program.we emphasise the tax deducation aspect of it all.
ie buy $10 worth of wrapping paper from catalog, school gets $3, it costs you $10 (for paper you could buy at walmart for $3)
donate $10 to school, school gets $10, and it costs you as little as $7 after tax.
we stopped all catalog sales. wasnt worth our time to process and handle. but it depends on demographics of the school, if cash donation program works. it doesnt work evrywhere.
Has anyone ever just asked for a donation instead of a catalog fundraiser?
I am asking because last years board sent out a letter saying that we would not be having catalog fundraisers this year, instead we wanted each child to donate x amount of money.
I can see where it might work, but I am nervous because we are a huge school (1200 students k-6) and our budget is $38,000.
If anyone has had success with a donation drive could you give me some pointers?
