As you are surely aware, there is currently a nation-wide recall of products containing peanut paste made by a Georgia-based company.

While each parent and school employee needs to be vigilant in making sure these products are removed from the general student population, we cannot forget that peanut butter cookie dough sold in fundraisers would also fall into this recall category.

I would advise any group who has in the recent past or who is currently selling cookie dough to contact the company to verify the status of their product.  (A list can be found here.) I can confirm, however, that the peanut butter cookie dough sold through our partner FastTrack Fundraising , including the Chippery brand, is safe for consumption and not under a recall.

The risks of not checking this out are real. So far, almost 500 people have become ill and six have actually died across the entire United States.

For more information, please click here to visit the Food and Drug Administration’s Peanut Butter Recall page.

Photo By: Plutor

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One of the most important factors to consider when you are deciding which school fundraiser to select is the percentage your school will receive from the overall take. After all, why should your students and their parents do all the hard work, when most of the profit goes back to the company? That makes no sense.

So, we are very happy to share some great news with you. Our friends over at FastTrack Fundraising have significantly increased the percentage of money your school gets to keep from their chocolate fundraisers. In the past, schools selling their brands of chocolate would receive 40% of the gross receipts, while 60% went back to FastTrack Fundraising. I do understand that high-quality chocolate is expensive, so I believe that justifies this kind of a percentage. However, they have now bumped the split across the board to 50-50.  In case of the $2 Chocolatiers Variety Pack , it’s now 60-40, in favor of the school! This is amazing! Chocolate fundraisers have always been a reliable and profitable income stream. This is even more true now.

In addition, FastTrack Fundraising has re-vamped their chocolate product line. While the ever-popular “World’s Finest Chocolate” is still available, they have also added the popular Dollar Bar, as well as the “Chocolatiers” selection from Van Wyk.  In addition, if any of you have ever tried the tremendous Hebert chocolate bars, take note, there has been a name change. Hebert chocolate is now called Lamontagne. Have no fear, it’s still the same company and the same high-quality chocolate; it’s just different packaging.

If you are still searching for a great way to raise money for your school this coming spring, I highly recommend you check out the chocolate sales program over at FastTrack Fundraising.

The service, the selection, the quality, and most of all- the percentage of the profits you get to keep- are all great reasons to choose an FastTrack Fundraising chocolate sale for your school! Enjoy!

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When I first took the position as the administrator of a private elementary school, I was curious what kind of a toolbox I would have access to. Most good toolboxes, of course, have many compartments to store different kinds of tools that will help complete a job.

The tools I was interested most in weren’t hammers and screwdrivers and wrenches, but rather donors, volunteers, and school spirit. All of the tools I was interested in would help shape our effort to provide the necessary funds to keep the school operational and thriving.

Unfortunately, the situation I walked into had a pretty empty toolbox, so one of my first tasks was to stock it with as many useful items as I could.

Today, I want to write about the tool of school spirit, and how it relates to fundraising success.

If you find yourself at a school that is struggling to raise money, whether it be in a small fundraiser like a cookie dough sale or a large event like an auction, one of the fundamental reasons for your lack of success may be a lack of school spirit.

Here are some questions you can ask yourself or others close to you to determine if your students, their parents, the teachers, key donors, and anyone else involved at your school has enough spirit to motivate them to work for your school’s financial success. continue reading

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It’s time to check in with the latest winners of the eFundraising’s magazine contest. For those of you who don’t know about this contest with great prizes, you can read all about it in a recent article I wrote.

But for a quick recap: eFundraising is holding a magazine sales contest on its site. All you have to do is visit this page and sign your group up. You will then be instructed on how to set up a virtual magazine store. It’s very easy.

Once this is all squared away, you email your friends, family, and other associates and ask them if they would like to support your child’s school by buying magazine subscriptions up to 85% off newsstand prices.

If they are interested, they just have to click the link in your email, follow the prompts, and your school is sent 40% of the sale price. Do this with enough people, and the total can really add up.
Now, here’s where the contest comes in. The top seller of the month taken from all of the participating groups wins an iPhone. The top seller for the entire promotional contest wins a 42” plasma television!

One of the recent winners of both the iPhone and flat screen television is Betty Michelli. She has an incredibly moving story. You’ll definitely want to read this. Here is what Betty experienced, in her own words: continue reading

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When you are developing an investment portfolio, it is wise to diversify. It’s good to have a little of this and a little of that, so that if one industry falls down, your entire portfolio won’t be negatively affected.

I think that you should approach your school fundraisers in a similar fashion. You’ll have one or two major events that are time intensive, like a golf outing or auction, but you’ll also have the comparatively less intensive ones, like selling cookie dough or chocolate.

I want to draw your attention, however, to one fundraiser that is so easy, all you have to do is tell people about it and then deposit the checks.

eFundraising, which is a division of Readers Digest, has an amazing program for magazine sales. The concept is very simple.

The first thing you have to do is sign up for your own online magazine shop. The “wizard” on the eFundraising site helps you with this very simple process.

The next thing you do is email all of the people in your community with the link to the online magazine store. There are over 700 magazines available, with many of the most famous periodicals available today. Prices are up to 85% off the cover prices, so your families will get a great deal on something they would have bought on their own anyway.

And that’s it! Once the families purchase the magazines, your school will get a check for 40% of the subscription price.

In the past, I’ve written that non-profits should strive for at least 50% of the profits from a product sale, but I will make this exception, because the process is so simple and automatic. The requirement of time and effort on your part is so minimal that 40% is actually incredibly generous.

The other advantage to this magazine sale is that it can run all year long! You aren’t confined to a two week sale, for instance. You can start this magazine fundraiser at the beginning of the year, and it can run all the way until June. Whenever a family orders a subscription, you get a check. Not a bad set up, huh?

And, it gets better. eFundraising is giving away incredible incentive prizes for top sellers each month. For the months of July to December of 2008, they are giving away an Apple iPhone ($400 cash equivalent) to the person who sells the most subscriptions of all participating groups! Click here to learn how to enter the contests.

Having been the principal of an elementary school, I know how exhausting fundraising can be. The amount of labor that can go into raising money is astronomical. Therefore, I absolutely love any method of fundraising that requires so little from me, yet the money keeps rolling in. I strongly urge you to take a closer look at the magazine program through eFundraising. It is well worth your time and effort!

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