Wow Juls! We have a Celebrations too, actually I think the name has changed. But they told me they wouldn't give donations or discounts. They said they MIGHT give me a 10% discount if I showed them our tax id #. So if someone is going to do that then they may want to call first just make sure they won't be wasting a trip.
I had better add that I take in the catalog with me and show what I am looking for and they are real helpful. "Celebrations" is a party supply place. I don't know if is is a national chain or not.
Also, I had a few kids look through the catalog and highlight what they thought was really cool since we kind of have different ideas about that.
You might want to check with a local company. We have a "Celebrations" that will sell to us at OT's prices and give another 10% off and we don't have to pay shipping. Another advantage is that you get to see and hold the stuff. Sometimes, the quality is not as good as it looks in the pics.
While I order from Oriental Trading, I have not found they have the best prices, especially when shipping is added. I like USToy (www.ustoy.com
), Rhode Island Novelty (www.rinovelty.com
) - especially for sand art bottles, and Kipp (www.kippbro.com
). Kipp has some gift items for men I order for the HOliday Shoppe. It also gives you free shipping for orders over $200.
This is our first Festival so it's all new to me! Our student council had a spring fun fair, but they ran out of prizes and I don't want that to happen. They also didn't have an assortment, so once they won a particular prize they didn't go back to the game. I have an order of about 450.00 and I hope that is enough. We are unsure of how many people we will have, so it's going to be a chance.
I am also in the process of getting donations from different companies. We are also doing raffle baskets. I will try some of the keycodes and if ever I get a 20% keycode I will post it as we should all benefit from any little savings.
I was able to snag that 20% discount along with the free shipping on an order for craft kits for our Kids Craft Workshop. I saved about $100. It is an early order incentive. Usually on the inside front cover........save an additional 20% if you place your order by________. Once I ordered I started receiving these savings offers via e-mail as well. I don't have a current catalog with this offer. If I can find one I will post the code for you. Good luck with the festival. About how much do you generally spend on prizes?? We ask our parents to donate candy to use as prizes which I would like to change. I'm afraid it will take some convincing to change the boards minds.
