Our school lunch is ran by a seperate company. They have a price list of available items and with the help of the principle we can purchase items from them. They are generally cheaper than the bulk stores. Start here for prices on all the food and paper items you will need. I would assume 4 people for every student, in order to have enough. Unless you are planning to pre-sell tickets. Our company will buy back what we do not use. If you do not have this option, you will need to go to local business and ask for a reduced price on items or donations.
Set food ticket prices more than what you spent on food.
The way the other poster described getting items for baskets to raffle is the same way we do it at my school. Since items for the baskets are donated, the winning bid is straight profit. Themes we use are: gardening, game night, beach party, arts & crafts, chocolate/coffee, baking, around the house, snack-o-rama, and Bucks(our High school mascot).
Decide on your times and get a volunteer schedule out for sign ups at least 1 month prior to the event. We typically use 45 min shifts, with the last shift helping with clean up.
The easiest way to work on baskets for a silent auction is to get the teachers to sponsor a themed basket. You provide a list of themes and the teachers select one and their students take home notes and their parents help fill it. (optional... You can run a contest. Pizza party for the class with the most successful basket)
Boy oh boy, did I put my foot in it! We are a middle school of 1,100 5th and 6th graders. This is my first year as Pres at this school and our principals first year also. Before this year, this schools PTO was not at all functioning. I am proud to say that my board has done a great job and we have made great progress. This is a school with a bad rep and we are trying to change that. We are having a Spaghetti dinner/Faclty- Student basketball game, along with a silent auction on April 23rd. We have decideed to invite all incoming 5th graders to this event. We have 5 elementary schools in our town and all 4th graders from each school will be here next year. We thought this would be a nice way for the kids and parents to get the feel of our school and hopefully see that we are a good school. My question is WHERE DO I BEGIN!!!? I know I need to start donations right away, but other than that what would be the best way to run this event? I have a feeling this is going to be the biggest one we have ever done . Any advice from my fellow PTO'ers would be great ! we would like to make a small profit from this.
