We host something like a clothing and book sale-- but we call it a mom2mom sale where we sell table spots and have a sale on a sat. morning--- from 9-1:00pm-- each person that rents a table brings all their items in and sets up their table -- sells their items and keeps that profit- we make the money renting the table space... and then we charge 1.00 per person to come shop the sale-- 100+ tables to find all kinds of great deals-- like a gigantic garage sale-- we have made up to 3,000.00 per sale-- and we host 2 a year- 1 in the fall and 1 in the spring-- the families sell items they have no use for any longer and possibly find new ones that they can use... it's a win- win for all involved....

we also run a concession stand at the same time--
this has wrked well for us over the4 last 5 years...

Our school just did a fundraiser in GA selling bed sheet sets. We did awesome because not only we one of the only groups selling them we made about $1000 a week (50 team members) for 11 weeks! we made a 75% rate of return and they did weekly deliveries. The guys name was Rob 404-966-1243- really nice and supportive.

We had a similar issue at our school - we wanted to do something different than the Cookie Dough and wrapping paper. We also had a difficult time getting the parents to donate class room money - with the current economy we are in a area where a lot of fmailies are still out of work. We did a Gold Buying party so the school and raised $1700. I t was great because we all made money and didn;t have to give any. The company that was there donated 20% of what they bought. It was a nice addition. THe company is national and has been at many of the PTA conventions - that was how our member had found them. I can find the name if you are interested.

What I like about your clothing and book sale is that the parents do not have to give any money. They contribute in a different way entirely so I don't see it as a strain or burden when it comes to overwhelming parents with more and more requests for their money and attention.

You can host this and it doesn't seem much like a fundraiser so it won't compete with the main fundraisers at the school.

It teaches a valuable lesson in recycling and giving things you no longer need to people who can use them but it's also a call to action - It's nice to have a reason to sort through things on a regular basis.

You leave the purchasing up to willing participants in the community who are no doubt happy to find some deals so the parents are not necessarily the target audience.

All-in-all, I think you have a good fundraiser there. It's a bit of work but I have seen a local sale that was similar grow to accept donations from the entire community and barely fit in a large conference center.

You have room to grow the event out and I believe it can become a profitable and helpful event for you that is repeatable year after year.

Hi. I am new to this web-site, but I started a new fundraiser at our school last year. It is a kid's clothing and book resale. We are a K-5 school with 250 students. Our first event raised $2,000. We are having our "2nd annual" this weekend. Essentially we have two collection times during the year (fall and spring). We do them in the form of a laundry basket war between the classes. Students have 3 days to donate gently used children's clothing items (size 4 and up) and books. These are all sorted (tired, worn items are retired or donated) and bagged by size and gender. These are then stored (garage attic).

We ran a very well-organized sale, with each table clearly labeled with the size and gender of clothing. Volunteers kept the tables neat throughout.

It was open to the pubic, and ran without a hitch. No expense other than a garage sale ad in the paper.

We did have the option to make that type of money with our cards too, but we had to buy the cards up front and find our own discounts. But the big problem was we had no idea how many we would sell and we were afraid to buy too many cards we could not sell and end up making a less percentage. The guy at premium access cards told us they could sell us the cards also, but we like the no up front money and no risk.