A school fundraising lesson courtesy of a major brand - Walmart.

Doing what's expected.

If your school is searching out a new and unique fundraising idea for fall 2010, consider this lesson from a major retailer. It reminds us why getting rid of things that people want is a risky proposition - even if it's not the most popular!

________________________________

Walmart returns items to shelves after lost sales
________________________________

To summarize, Walmart, in an effort to replace items with lower sales with new items, pulled a number of items from stores. It turns out that by removing something the community counted on, they lost the sale.

In the case of Walmart, they realized that instead of customers selecting another item in it's place, they choose to go elsewhere in many cases and do their entire shopping where they could get the specific item they were originally looking for.

When it comes to elementary school fundraising, if you can create a consistent set of fundraisers, whatever they are, you win! The Walmart story reminds us first-hand that if you remove something the customer is willing to support, they may not be willing to support it's replacement.

Concrete Examples

If you do a gift and wrap catalog sale in fall you are already doing the biggest and most profitable fundraiser of the year that we know about.

If you do a well-promoted event such as a thon or an auction and it has popularity and support within the community you are building a repeatable success as well.

If, on the other hand, you were to replace these with the newest and most unique school fundraisers, they must be more popular and more exciting than ever! As Walmart reminds us, you will lose customers just by switching to a new fundraiser the community doesn't understand or expect. Sometimes, new and unique fundraising ideas are not all they appear.

Plus, anything new and unique to fundraising doesn't sell anyway (whoops, did I say that out loud?). What seems perhaps a better way to close is to say that the world progresses by introducing new and unique things - we just need time to get used to them :)
_____________________________

Author Note: I believe that there are some risky fundraisers out there for this fall. They include gift card sales for online shopping, home cookie dough delivery vouchers or any fundraiser that does not have a proper student prize program. Until there is a proven track record with these items, you may consider something else if you really have to meet a fundraising budget.
_____________________________

Jay Moneta is the Vice President of Believe Kids Fundraising and I blog nearly daily here at fundraising-advice.com

If you enjoy my posts, please follow my blog and write comments and send it to your friends and even criticize or send feedback to me here or on twitter - twitter.com/BelieveKids

My company homepage can be found here: http://www.BelieveKids.com

Thanks for looking!

Get behind your school fundraisers and events!

It's been my long-standing belief that when people get behind something, results follow. Results don't have to always be monetary either. When people get behind something, they provide a sense of allegiance and appreciation. They let people know that their contributions were acknowledged and they build a stronger sense of community.

I was reminded about this in two ways recently.

First off, I had the privilege to attend a frozen cookie dough delivery at a school yesterday. It was a joy to see this very smooth and organized delivery. The principal, an employee at the school and two amazing teachers showed that by putting their efforts in, a successful school-run fundraiser would surely follow.

Secondly and in polar contrast to the first though just mentioned, I read a news story from enterprizenews.com about a Haiti Relief Fundraiser that went bad. Not bad in the fact that they didn't raise money for Haiti. They did actually raise quite a bit of money. In this case, the city promoted the event and then some key players didn't show up. This left the community reeling that they had no business not showing up when they were promoting the event.

____________________________________


Read 'Organizer of Haiti fundraiser slams Brockton officials who didn't attend'

____________________________________

Fundraising is intended to strengthen communities. Individual people are not obligated to get involved but do for a purpose. It's to be part of a cohesive group that collectively makes an impact.

It's not always obvious

You don't get to follow your money from your fundraising catalog purchase to the staple used on the paper your child wrote. You don't get to buy the actual food for a Haitian family and bring it home for them.

It's symbolic in a way. So what is more important is having some key people support the fundraising events. Someone just there to say 'Thank you' and just to be there if for no reason other than to show that the busy individuals that didn't have to participate know that their contribution was appreciated.

This leads to confidence and encourages even more participation down the road. Will the school who's Principal is front and center making sure to talk to each and everyone of the people who sold fundraising products be more likely to have support the next time around? Yes! On top of that, the rest of the volunteers made the process quick and easy and thanked EVERYONE! I believe they will continue to have good participation from parents and the community.

On the flip side

Will the city officials host a fundraiser with a capacity crowd again anytime soon? Unfortunately, by not showing up when expected, they sent a message. They let the community know that the cause and event was not important to them. They did not give the attendees the symbolic acknowledgment that their time, efforts and contributions were appreciated. Surely, the people of Haiti win either way because funds were still raised, but, the next time around... will the next fundraiser have the same level of participation? Not likely. Not until the people who are making sacrifices for you believe you will be appreciative of them.

____________________________________

Authors note:

By the way, I understand that these folks may have had some very good reasons for not attending their fundraiser. The impression that they should have been at the event is the problem. My point is that if you are involved with something get behind it and show up. But, if you're not actively involved then nobody would expect you to be there in the first place.

When it comes to this school that succeeded at their frozen food fundraiser, they have a consistent track record of getting behind efforts they put on and they don't overdo it.

They put on less events and fundraisers, etc. during the school year and do everything with excellence instead of a lot of things in an average way. Anyway, they rock! It was a fun day watching them really make everyone feel special and a part of something great.

I also believe that getting behind something helps with literally every event or effort we put forth. It's just a basic principal that we get out what we put in.

____________________________________

Jay Moneta is the Vice President of Believe Kids Fundraising and encourages comments and suggestions here on each blog post. I can also be reached on twitter. www.twitter.com/BelieveKids

Thanks for looking!