Fund Raising

[schmalex]

OK, to set the scene. I went to our local school PTA AGM this evening, looking to become a member to raise funds for the school. Ended up being stitched up voted in as the chairman of the PTA

FY 2007 - 2008, they geneerated £5k revenue with a GP of £1.5k.

FY 2008 - 2009, I plan to generate in excess of £10k GP.

Any help would be appreciated. I am already thing about approcahing local businesses to sponsor various activities / initiatives etc, in addition to the usual Xmas fayres, sponsored walks etc, etc, etc. Additionally, I plan to approach a couple of the larger businesses around the area for a fund match etc.

Background is a small rural village. 80 odd 5 - 11 yr old's in the school (split between our village & the village a couple of miles down the road). Some pretty affluent old & new money around the area.

I hand it over to the PH crew to come up with some left-field ideas

[MentalSarcasm]

Hold a craft fair without charging 50 quid for a table? No idea where in the "south" you're in but there's a bunch of us in the Cambridge area that are despairing over the lack of craft fairs in our area, let alone ones that don't cost a fortune just for a table.

[schmalex]

MentalSarcasm said:

Hold a craft fair without charging 50 quid for a table? No idea where in the "south" you're in but there's a bunch of us in the Cambridge area that are despairing over the lack of craft fairs in our area, let alone ones that don't cost a fortune just for a table.

Newbury / Basingstoke area. I would look to charge £15 - £20 for a table max - £50 is farrrrrrrrrrr too much

[Kinky]

Sue does the [very successful] fundraising for our local school. I'll point her in this direction.

K

[schmalex]

Kinky]Sue does the [very successful said:

fundraising for our local school. I'll point her in this direction.

K

Really appreciated - I really want the kids to reap some big rewards, as some of them come from pretty disadvantaged backgrounds

[bobthemonkey]

How good are the school records of its Alumni? Direct mail and telephone calls for donations can produce astounding results.

[Ordinary Bloke]

schmalex said:

Background is a small rural village. 80 odd 5 - 11 yr old's in the school (split between our village & the village a couple of miles down the road).

In what way are they 'odd'? Is there a limited gene-pool involved (e.g. are you your own Grandaddy)?

[Simpo Two]

I recently went to my old school reunion dinner. The price was just about OK but the food was cheap and they nicked the wine and chocolates back.

I just found out there was a 'marketing company' involved? WTF?

[MentalSarcasm]

brickwall said:

Fundraising dinners.
Charge £50-£100 a head - revenue from tickets therefore should be well in excess of £7k.
Have an auction of promises: get locals to donate anything you can get your hands on. A week in someones place in Spain, A pedicure at a beauty salon etc. Sales from this are totally profit.

It's all about who's in the area. In some places I've known the local PTA to raise £10k per event, and to run 5-6 per year. In other places that's just not possible.


ETA: School with 80 kids - if you manage £10k revenue you're doing damn well.

Edited by brickwall on Thursday 25th September 22:50

My sister's school had a "fish and chip dinner" event, less than 50 quid a head obviously, and then said auction of promises. Raised about 3k IIRC and we're a small village.

[speedchick]

schmalex said:

MentalSarcasm said:

Hold a craft fair without charging 50 quid for a table? No idea where in the "south" you're in but there's a bunch of us in the Cambridge area that are despairing over the lack of craft fairs in our area, let alone ones that don't cost a fortune just for a table.

Newbury / Basingstoke area. I would look to charge £15 - £20 for a table max - £50 is farrrrrrrrrrr too much

£15 to £20 is about reasonable, a lot of crafters would be interested in that, one thing though, make sure if you go down the craft fair route that you have people that make the stuff, not the ones that buy cheap tat and try to pass it off as handmade. MentalSarcasm will know what I am talkign about.

Best to place to find people to be the stall holders are on the various craft forums, they all welcome events like this. That way you will get a good mix of people. (and genuine make it themselves crafters too!)

[wobert]

schmalex said:

OK, to set the scene. I went to our local school PTA AGM this evening, looking to become a member to raise funds for the school. Ended up being stitched up voted in as the chairman of the PTA

FY 2007 - 2008, they geneerated £5k revenue with a GP of £1.5k.

FY 2008 - 2009, I plan to generate in excess of £10k GP.

Any help would be appreciated. I am already thing about approcahing local businesses to sponsor various activities / initiatives etc, in addition to the usual Xmas fayres, sponsored walks etc, etc, etc. Additionally, I plan to approach a couple of the larger businesses around the area for a fund match etc.

Background is a small rural village. 80 odd 5 - 11 yr old's in the school (split between our village & the village a couple of miles down the road). Some pretty affluent old & new money around the area.

I hand it over to the PH crew to come up with some left-field ideas

I've been the Treasurer for my children's HSA (Home/School Association) for the past 4 years. The school is similar to yours in size / age group.

In that time we've raised c30k. The last two years being 11k & 10k respectively.

Our income is generated in several ways....

We do a "Charity Car Wash" (we are a registered charity), once a term. Four hrs on a Saturday usually makes between 4-600 pounds. This is then match funded to double it.

We hold an annual Casino Night, this pulls in 2k which again is match funded, albeit not to the full amount.

We run a 100 Club. We usually get 50 or so "entries" which generates a profit of around 300 pounds.

Last year we got 5k funding to create a school garden.

If you want any further info PM me and I'll try to assist!

Robert

Edited by wobert on Friday 26th September 14:09

[MentalSarcasm]

speedchick said:

schmalex said:

MentalSarcasm said:

Hold a craft fair without charging 50 quid for a table? No idea where in the "south" you're in but there's a bunch of us in the Cambridge area that are despairing over the lack of craft fairs in our area, let alone ones that don't cost a fortune just for a table.

Newbury / Basingstoke area. I would look to charge £15 - £20 for a table max - £50 is farrrrrrrrrrr too much

£15 to £20 is about reasonable, a lot of crafters would be interested in that, one thing though, make sure if you go down the craft fair route that you have people that make the stuff, not the ones that buy cheap tat and try to pass it off as handmade. MentalSarcasm will know what I am talkign about.

Best to place to find people to be the stall holders are on the various craft forums, they all welcome events like this. That way you will get a good mix of people. (and genuine make it themselves crafters too!)

Yes there are a lot of people around nowadays that buy wholesale crap and then sell it on as "hand made", apparantly it's becoming a huge problem in America and is starting to spread over here

15-20 is definitely reasonable, and you'll probably find a few of the Mums or children's aunts are crafters who'll jump on the chance to sell some of it. If you've got time to organise it to be held before Christmas then do so as lots of crafters are planning their Christmas selling campaign now and will happily book a few months in advance.