PTA - what was your biggest money spinner?

[moneytree]

Hi, Just curious - what activity raised the most money/which was your biggest success?

Also, what was the most hysterical money raiser?

Our school PTA does a Bonfire and Fireworks Night every year. It's been going on for about 25 years and is a popular community event. The amount raised varies but it's between £3-7,000, but is a lot of work. It's in the dark, involves fire and fireworks so there's a lot of insurance, lighting and safety considerations.

Thanks for feedback

May ball - black tie do with auction and mega raffle.

Tickets are £30 which doesn't raise that much but the auction etc brings in the £££ as prizes donated.

This year we raised about £4,000. A Lot of work tho.

Grief, how big are your schools?! Our summer fair is probably our biggest money spinner, we raised about £2500 this year. Only a little school though...

We usually raise between £700 and £1500 at a fair - various times of year and in 2 schools, infant and junior, 200 /300 pupils. So I reckon £2.5k is very good going.

The May ball raises a lot of dough because some people come and are prepared to spend hundreds and the committee persuades people to donate eg signed footballs, fancy haircuts, special days out etc as prizes.

Our summer fair is our biggest earner - we raised 9,000 at this years. Big school though - 400 pupils.

christmas fair we raised £7000 this year
summer fete also raised £5000

Auction of promises - raised several £'000s I seem to recall. Although there were some 'big ticket' items a lot of it was 'little' things volunteered from regular parents e.g. babysitting, gardening, professional services (e.g. simple website deign etc)

blimey sandyballs, £9k at a fair! What is bringing in that amount of money???

400 is a big school I agree. But our 2 combined are 500. I bet we couldn't get that kind of figure at a joint fair (partly because the same people are on both PTAs )

Our infant school (210) would raise £7k at the summer fair-amazing amounts.
Sponsored skip (kids got free rope to keep) was over £3000.
Match funding is fantastic, extra dosh for nothing!

Hi,

Can you tell me more about match funding? never heard of that one, sounds interesting

Some businesses eg Barclays Bank will give you money eg if you raise £500 on a raffle, they will give you another £500. I think you have to have an employee of the business as a parent in the school.
Have a look on the national pta website- I'm sure they'll have more info there.

A parent at our school worked for Barclays and they had some kind of scheme where they double what you raise.

Happy's circus

Great, thank you.

can you tell me what stalls etc you have at these events to make so much money? and how much you charge?

our newly formed pta is holding the first proper xmas fair this year (the school hasn't had one for too many years) and we want to make it a big success.

so far we've got a beany babies tombola (bb's donated by a teacher); a regular tombola and a chocolate tombola.

We have spin the wheel bottle tombola which raises the most money at christmas/summer fair.

Other things we have are;

Sportsmans night. £30 ticket with free bar (mainly pints) buffet and sports personality speaker. Raffles

Ladies night. Similar but for the ladies usually an act and disco

Summer family bbq

Big sleepover in the school hall

Halloween disco

lottery/bonus ball

Pamper Night £800

film night - one per term - £250 per film

Camping Night - £10 per pitch - 18 Sept so will report back!

School Fete - £5000

Xmas Fete - £4000
We do food at ours and DH cooks so we can make stacks of money from doing a veggie soup and rolls and we did hotdogs too.

Santa's Grotto makes good money. Small gift. £2 per visit.

Lucky cups. Get lots of PTA members to fill plastic cups with bits of tacky stuff - sweets, pencils etc and charge £1.50 per cup. We do wrap them in cellophane with ribbons so they look fab.

Lucky Dip. Cheap things. Prize every time.

Dont go with too many outside stalls as people come to the bazaar with a certain amount to spend and if they spend on other stalls then you dont get the money!

bumping old thread

??

Wow. Some hefty sums of money on here! I guess some schools have a richer cohort

One of our biggest money spinners is actually just the straightforward jumble sale. We usually raise £1000 each time, and have two per year. Lots of fun.

the school we were involved with before had a Fireworks display it was intense work yes but I wouldnt say a huge amount of work we raised about 1500 every year..

hot and cold drinks hotdogs popcorn (done the day before and bagged) and chocolate biscuits for the kids. one year we did beer and muled wine too (didnt go massively well I have to say nor did the helium baloons)

Keep it simply and entryfee is what gets the dosh in.

the very small primary my kids are now in (101 students) just raised £6000 with an auction of promises

jumble 1600
disco 800
auction of promises 4000
summer fare 9000

We have booked an Auction of Promises in for May.

Just need to get parents to promise things now!