We just finished a Scholastic book fair. We have used them for years and take our profit in cash. We work directly with the corporate offices in California as opposed to a local rep. We have negotiated quite a few perks such as free book coupons for needy students, etc. We also vet the merchandise as it comes in and have been very specific that we will only sell books, no "junk" such as pencils, toys, etc. Also if there is a book that is deemed unsuitable by the teachers (such as WWWF books, etc) we do not sell those either. We did very well with just the books...about $9100 gross!
Yes there is an alternative! Our school used Usborne books this year and everyone loved their top quality educational books (including the kids)at reasonable prices. If you would like more info email me. They also offer a fundraiser read-a-thon.
I was glad to see this addressed. We switched from Scholastic to Troll during the past year as well. I found Scholastic was getting a little too comfortable with the fact that we had always used them and weren't really doing anything for us in return. We investigated many alternatives.. Coming from an area of moderately low economics, our school was not in a position to make a change that would possibly lose sales or discourage them, so we got ourselves a great plan with Troll where we received lots of bargain books and really neat incentives and we came out of our bookfair with the largest profit for dollar ever! Troll was 1st class the whole way. Now, with our Spring fair approaching, we're in the position where Scholastic is calling every other day trying to woo us back!
Maybe next year...
We hold two Scholastic book fairs each year. Our students, parents and teachers love them! I'm sorry to hear your not satisfied. If we took all our profit in cash, we would make a decent profit. However, we take books so that after the book fair, we have a day where each student gets to come pick out a book for free. We also select books to give to new students registering for kindergarten.
All parents are invited to volunteer and come in to help their child shop.
Our principal handles the book fairs through Troll. We have told him that, as parents from mostly low-income households, it is hard for most of our families to purchase books through this company. He offers the bookfairs and always sells at 2 for 1, with no profit.
Our P.T.O. offers a used book fair for our students, with most books priced under $1. We have established a business partnership with a local re-sale business to get books for this. The business donates children's books to us, by the boxfuls, which we use for this and to give out books to students at such things as FAMILY LITERACY EVENTS. When it comes to reading and bookfairs; we feel that it is more important to get books into students' hands than it is to make a profit. We also order a supply of pencils, erasers, pens, bookmarks and crayons to go with the used bookfairs we do.
LORI
Our PTO holds a spring and fall bookfair, one through Trool and one through Scholastic. We also do not use these for fundraisers. Instead we are concerned with putting a book in every child's hands. Our population is generally low income, so we always sell the books at buy one, get one free. It cuts the price in half for the kids. Usually, the company offers special incentives if you sell them this way and we actually sell more. Plus, families who simply don't have the extra $ for books, can get a book for two siblings in one purchase. It works very well for us.
