Every year schools and non-profit organizations strive to provide services with limited funding and available resources. The key to improving funding for your group is to activity engage in activities with your members and the community to make your goals a reality. Some of the best fundraising ideas come from just talking with your classroom, staff members or volunteers. Raising funds is not easy in uncertain economic times. Every member of your community will not write out a check or place a contribution in the bucket, even if they are aware of your good works. What you need is a fund raising strategy that earns money and gets everyone involved. Making or selling a well liked product can be the best way to increase revenue and grow your charitable foundation.
Bake sales held by school and church groups is a good example of this trend. Volunteers agree to bake and present their wares with all or a portion of the monies going towards the goal amount. A famous example of this occurs every year when the national organization the Girl Scouts begins their cookie campaign. This started many years ago when individual troops of girls would bake their own cookies and sell them to finance their camping trips. Nowadays, cookies are professionally manufactured by well known brands whose boxes carry the Girl Scout name and logo.
Consider having a cookie sale of your own to create that necessary income flow. A fun and profitable cookie sale would be to arrange to sell Otis Spunkmeyer brand cookies. These prepacked, large and delicious cookies already enjoy a large following. Your volunteers could sell individual cookies or create boxes or baskets for gifts. Your volunteers could take orders ahead of time if necessary to make sure everyone pays and gets exactly what they ordered. Cookies could be sold during school or company lunch hours for a treat . A table or display of cookies set up at the time of a company meeting or coffee break is sure to be a hit. Dressing up your volunteers in catchy, colorful and eye catching outfits creates attention to your cookie table.
