We have been doing ours for years and have pretty much got it down to a science at this point. While we certainly do run out of some items we always have pleanty of other stuff to buy. My suggestion to you is to keep really good notes on what you order and inventory it as well. See where you fell short and use that as a guidline to help you with your ordering process for next years store. Having those notes when you place your orders for next years store will really help you decide how much to order of each specific item. Ordering a little more then you think you need isn't a bad thing. We always box up what we have left over and save it for next years store. All the leftover stuff becomes pure profit the following year.
I would highly reccomend doing your own store to anyone who can do it. This way the money goes back to your group, the kids, & the school instead of lining the pockets of a business.
We are in the middle of ours as well. we do use a company as we really could never be able to budget enough to do a good enough job with the buying. It would be interesting to do it on our own but somehow I don't see that working. Tonight we are suppose to be running it with our first ever "Holidays around the world and in our community" night only they are saying bad snow so after school may be cancelled...we will see!
"When you stop learning you stop growing."
We are in the thick of ours -- we've been doing about $2K a day. 12 more classes need to come through and then we let the staff and visiting parents come in next week.
Not quite paid for yet, but we still have a lot of stuff.
If you don't expect too much from me, you might not be let down. <img src=images/smilies/smile.gif>
wow! i am always so impressed when I hear someone does it without a company. i don't think my group would ever be so brave. We go through a company and run out of the same items every day, reorder those same items and still get limited amounts of them. yet we fuss about it. Go figure!
The kids have a mind of their own. I'll see something I think is going to sell like crazy and no one will even touch it. yet the things I think will never sell, go like hotcakes! Go figure!
Good luck on the rest of the shoppe! And congrat's on how great you've done so far!
Well we did kipp brothers, goodtime attractions, accessories palace and the dollar store this year instead of going through a company. We are getting huge raves from the teachers and the kids are acutally going home with change.
Only next year I will have to fine tune on how much to order we ordered a lot less than we should of we had to go out several times. Its really hard trying to guess how much to get for 600 students.
But the kids are enjoying it.
Cindy
Cindy<br />
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<br>"People have the right to be stupid, but some abuse the privelege."
