School Fundraising Ideas - Part One

Posted by Nick Niesen on November 8th, 2010

Looking for a good school fundraising idea?

You're not the only one. The good news is that there are other school fundraising ideas besides coordinating a special event or conducting a catalog-based fundraiser.

These often end up overwhelming your supporters with multiple fund raising products that aren't everyday items for most people.

In this series, we'll take a look at three school fundraising ideas. Part One looks at Discount Shopping Cards.

These are simple products that your group can offer that provide these benefits:

1) They are easy to sell
2) They offer good value
3) They produce excellent results

Using Discount Shopping Cards for your school fundraiser has benefits that are easy to explain to your supporters, they have widespread appeal, and each can be offered for immediate sale or sold via a simple brochure.

School Fundraising Ideas: Discount Shopping Card

What exactly is a discount shopping card?

It is a wallet-sized card packed with a selection of prearranged discounts at local and national merchants in your area. Most usually contain a dozen special offers that save the bearer either a fixed amount or a percentage discount.

Each card usually retails for $10 and provides for almost unlimited usage of the special offers. The only exception is when you custom design a card to feature a special one-time only discount from a sponsoring merchant.

This type of premium offering is often worth half the purchase price all by itself, such as a $5 discount from a national oil change company.

Other money saving examples include free drinks with a fast food order, $1 or more off on a submarine sandwich, savings on video rentals, haircut discounts, free ice cream, and other special offers.

Because of their high perceived value (what family doesn't want to save money these days?), these are excellent fundraisers.

Discount cards can often produce impressive unit sales per participant. It's not unusual for each seller to make ten or more sales.

Another interesting benefit is the unique customization of the discount card. Many suppliers can place your schools' name and logo on the front side of each card. This firmly affixes your group's value proposition in their minds for the next time around.

Cards are usually good for a one year period and bear an expiration date on the front. This creates a built-in market for repeat sales.

In the supplier cross-reference section of my book, Fundraising Success, I list 27 suppliers for these discount cards.

As with any type of fund raising product it pays to do more than a little supplier research.

Costs for 1,000 unit batches begin at $6 with many of them and drop as low as $1.00 from the best suppliers.

Among school fund raising ideas, discount shopping cards are a perennial favorite. They also make a good overlay or add-on item for a catalog fundraiser.

Using Discount Shopping Cards for your school offers a great profit for the school and a great value for your customers.