Middle Age Dad needs to look at a recent survey of over 300 PTO members to see that the BEST and most profitable fundraiser for schools is still the catalog sale. What about a tub of cookie dough for $14-$18? It makes 24 small cookies at most...go to Costco or Target and get a quality same cookie dough tub for $7...same thing.
Don't lump all catalog sales together...they are all different.
Thank you Shirley! I'll get in touch with Mishelle to get more info. Do you (or shinning mountain) have her email address as well? At the moment our board is so busy with end of the year activities that we've been trying to use a method of communication that lets us all see it at once instead of playing phone tag passing it on to each other.
As far as the whole profit percentage thing goes, I can see both sides of it. On the one hand I agree that you can't take a percentage to the bank. But on the other hand, I look at the fact that we are currently selling around 25k-30k per year with our current company and we get to keep 50% of that. So if our sales stay relatively the same with a new company but our percentage of profit drops we could lose a decent amount of money.
Maybe the profit percentage matters less if you're trying a totally new program or if you haven't had much success with the company you're currently with? I honestly don't know. I am definitely willing to consider losing a few percentage points if the company offers other benefits or incentives that we aren't getting with our current company.
I don't mean to start any type of argument on this point. But I am curious about how others view the issue, since I can't really find an argument that would make me come down on one side or the other.
If a school does that well on a sale, why do you worry about what percentage they give. I notice that is always one of the first questions when someone discovers a new company. Heck, if my school could make $25,000, the company can give me 30%. Percentage of profit never has been related to how much profit you make. Look at cookie dough, it continues to grow every year with most companies offering 40% profit. I guess they could offer 50%, but then the retail price would be $18-$20 per tub. Who is going to buy it at that price, but hey, there is your 50% profit. That is what has happened with the gift catalogs. The schools want a higher percentage, so the companies just raise the retail prices. These catalog sales have gone down every year since 2002. People are tired of paying for a "Santa plate" that is made overseas for $2.00 and is sold in a retail store for $8, but somehow it is okay for the school to charge $24.
We LOVE West Coast!!! We used them this last fall and again this spring. The most we ever made was 9000.00 combined both fall and spring. This fall we did 25000.00 and with spring it was over 300000.00!!! I know hard to belive, if you would like to varify this please call shinning mountain elementary in spanaway washington. Our president is Lori and she will tell you how great Mishelle and West Coast are. The kids and the teachers just loved the whole thing. Last year they did a Kid Power theme and we still have the posters up in our school.
