Our school doesn't do a santa shop as a fundraiser..it is strictly to give the kids a place to shop. We use a dollar store, charge $1.25/item and hold it for 2 1/2 days. We order envelopes that have lines for the parents to list each person that they are to buy for, age, sex, etc. (uncle tommy may be 12, but he doesn't want a dog toy). We have about 4 ppl who shop, we each take a catagory, usually buy 3000 items total, so if i was doing dad, i'd write down that we want screwdriver sets, flashlights, wallets, etc., and when all the listing is done (at the store) we go home and figure out how many of each item that we think we need (100-300). THEN we take the list back to the store manager, and he pulls what we want, usually by the case, and we go pick it up the day before the sale. We have a deal that we can do as many exchanges as we like during the sale, and when it's over, if we have under 300 items we can get a refund, over that we get 1/2 cash, 1/2 merchandise. Last yr we got our merchandise as stuff we could sell at school store (pencils, rulers, hair ties) and 2 yr planners for the whole staff. It's a lot of work to do it this way, but we have been successful for 7 yrs now, and still make about a 50$ profit after buying envelopes, coffee, etc.
