How to Promote Your Virtual School Fundraiser

By Coryn Diehl on November 20, 2020 / Holiday Fundraising Tips

How to Promote Your Virtual School Fundraiser

7 Easy Tips for Promoting Your Online Holiday Shoppe

Putting together a school holiday shop fundraiser virtually can feel like a challenge. Parents and schools are tasked with finding a way to raise money for their schools while giving kids their dose of holiday cheer — all online.

Here at the Kids’ Kastle, we’ve put together three school holiday shoppe options that run the gamut from safely hosted in-person, entirely virtual, and a hybrid for schools that need both. Opting for a virtual holiday shop is just the first part of putting the fundraiser together, however.

In order to ensure your holiday virtual fundraising is a success, we’ve put together 7 great tips for how to promote your virtual holiday shop, so kids get all the cheer and the schools can raise their much-needed funds with low stress and great success.

Announce Your Virtual Secret Santa Shop via Email Marketing

Email marketing is a tried and true method that we can’t recommend enough. Whether your school is in-person or online, every parent is checking their email frequently so they don’t miss out on important updates.

Send out a newsletter to all parents announcing the virtual holiday shop for this year. Even if you go with a standard or hybrid in school holiday shoppe, your newsletter can outline all the precautions you are taking and how parents and kids can order this year.

Make sure the newsletter uses bright colors, bold text, and gets straight to the point. Include a line asking parents to forward news about the virtual fundraising events to all of those who may be interested, to create more hype and further interest in the event.

Share Your Secret Santa Shop on Social Media

Candy fundraisers are typically something you’d see for baseball, softball, and other sports’ teams, but there’s nothing like a good candy drive, especially if you buy in bulk and give people options when purchasing what they want.

It might sound like a unique school fundraiser, but in truth, it’s taking virtual fundraiser ideas for schools and expanding it a bit to ensure that people have more than one choice and can buy what they want while helping with a good cause. Utilizing New Jersey school fundraising companies that offer multiple candy options is a great way to expand on the traditional candy fundraiser.

Take Advantage of Partnerships for Your Holiday Shoppe

Are there any local businesses that are helping you run your school holiday shop this year? Ask them to help you spread the word!

Whether they do so on-site at their business, mention it in their newsletters, post about it on social media, or just talk about it with their clients, it’s another great way to get news about your virtual fundraiser out there.

Partnerships for school fundraisers are generally focused on promoting the school as much as possible, so don’t be shy about asking for a little social boost from your school fundraising partners.

Even if your school is hosting its holiday shoppe on its own, reach out to other partners you’ve worked with in the past and see if they’ll include a link to your virtual fundraising on their website, social apps, or email newsletters.

Don’t Forget Mailed Newsletters & Postcards for Holiday Gift Shops

Sometimes, the best school fundraisers are going to be those that will be able to promote some type of social distancing while still keeping things fun and engaging. While a virtual party isn’t quite the same, it’s a fun way to connect with people and maintain a good line of communication among the community.

Games can even be planned online that will be fun for everyone involved, for a small donation of course. Have online raffles, promotions, talent shows, and more! The great thing about a virtual party is that everyone can attend!

When in Doubt, Use Word of Mouth for Your Secret Santa Shoppe

Nothing works better for school fundraising promotion than a personal recommendation via word of mouth. Hype up the hybrid or virtual holiday gift shop to parents, teachers, and even the students. The more excited everyone is, the more they will talk about it, share the news, and encourage others to get involved.

At the end of the day, the results are all focused on the kids, so if this is your highlight for your Secret Santa Gift Shop, snifty pencils people will be more than willing to share the news with others in their life. This year, people could use holiday cheer more than ever!

Holiday Gift Shoppes are Easily Promoted with a Catchy Tagline

Another way to spread the word about your school’s holiday gift shop is with a catchy tagline. Mention the fun for the kids, the great gifts, or just include something optimistic and fun that makes people smile!

If your promotional materials bring joy, more people will choose to get involved with the virtual holiday shoppe and tell their friends about it.

Make Sure Your Virtual Fundraiser Has a Great Graphic Design

No matter what avenue you opt for for your holiday fundraising, make sure you have a great graphic to promote it! Something with bright colors, a big title, and a fun image will capture everyone’s attention and make them want to be apart of the fun.

Include a stellar graphic as part of your to-do list when organizing the virtual fundraiser, as this is more likely to get people involved.

10 Best Virtual Christmas Fundraising Ideas

By Coryn Diehl on November 9, 2020 / Holiday Fundraising Tips

Top 10 Best Virtual and Creative Christmas Fundraising Ideas

Brainstorming fundraising ideas for this winter isn’t an easy task. Schools can’t rely on traditional holiday shoppe fundraiser, snifty pencils, dances, or other large events that involve gatherings. While some companies, like Kids’ Kastle, offer hybrid and virtual secret santa gift shops, this isn’t something that all schools have access to or it doesn’t pull in the same funds that schools need.

To help get motivated and create some holiday cheer, we’ve put together 10 virtual and creative winter fundraising ideas any school can take advantage of. We focused on low-cost, easy set-up, and maximum interest levels. We hope that these holiday fundraising ideas excite all students from elementary school to seniors, and can complement your normal holiday gift shop fundraiser.

A Snowman Building Contest is a Fun Holiday Fundraising Idea

We love the snowman building contest because it’s flexible for virtual and online school set-ups! If you’re having an in-person school holiday shop fundraiser, you can schedule the snowman building contest to run the same day. This allows your visiting student and family groups to keep social distance as they build outside and shop inside, and it creates decorations everyone can enjoy!

Even if you’re not doing a Christmas shop fundraiser, you can run your snowman building contest one of two ways. Invite families out to build their snowman at safe distances on the school grounds, or have families make the snowmen at home and send in pictures with the students standing by their creations!

A small fee to enter with an affordable prize will get families active, involved, and raise funds easily for your school.

Host an Ugly Sweater Contest

This is another Christmas fundraising idea for schools that works for schools on-line or in person. For students and families who come on-site to shop your school Christmas shop, have them dress up and pay a small fee to enter the ugly sweater contest. Have a few different prizes you can reward at the end of the shopping day to celebrate the winners — people can vote, or you can have a panel of judges from the PTA or student council.

If all of your school holiday fundraisers are staying online, host the contest virtually! Students and families can either submit photos that everyone votes on, or you can do a virtual video session, like a fashion show! Either way, everyone will have a great time voting, dressing up, and chatting about the holiday.

Think Outside Traditional School Christmas Shop Ideas and Involve the Family Pets

One great thing about virtual fundraising ideas is that you can think about how to include the pets of the students! Have students and families submit photos of their pets dressed up in holiday outfits, celebrating winter holidays, or matching their owners in look-a-like contests.

Families and students will love showing off their pets and getting creative with photography and outfits. Post the photos online and let the voting begin! Have a small fee to enter with fun prizes families will want to win — maybe it could even be a free gift from your school’s Santa gift shop or something for the pets themselves.

Make Your Holiday Gift Shop Fundraiser a Virtual Silent Auction

A fun school Christmas shop idea is to create a virtual silent auction! Students love the traditional holiday gift shop fundraiser, and this adds an additional element to help get parents, families, and community members involved.

Work to create partnerships with the community, and offer prizes like gift baskets, gift cards, discounts, meet and greets, and more. The great thing about a holiday virtual silent auction is it can run for an extended period of time, it can raise plenty of funds, and it shows a community connection.

These also offer gift ideas to those placing the bids, so you’re more likely to see people engaging and promoting the sale.

When in Doubt, You Can’t Beat a Raffle for a School Fundraiser

Raffles are a tried and true school fundraiser idea, and it’s one everyone can take advantage of, online or in person. Just like with your silent auction, team up with local community businesses or creatives for some fun and exciting raffle prizes.

Whether these are tailored to the kids and come from your holiday gift shop, or you create something for the parents, it’s sure to create a buzz of excitement.

Raffles can be hosted both in school and virtually, and you can choose between shipping the items or having local pick up stations. Raffles have the potential to be limitless with funds, and are easily promoted. No matter how elaborate or simple you decide to go, look into your options for a raffle this season.

A Fun Holiday Fundraiser Idea is Wreath Sales

Consider the members on your school’s PTA and other teachers and parents that get involved each year with the fundraisers — chances are, you know more than one crafty and artistic person who is a wiz with homemade items. A wreath sale is the perfect opportunity to take advantage of those crafty skills from the parents and teachers in your community!

Pull together a group to create holiday wreaths, and involve the help of the students! These can then be sold online or in person to raise money for your school. This is a great holiday fundraising idea because each wreath is unique, handmade, and comes directly from the local community and even from the students themselves. It may involve a bit more prep, but is well worth it for the fun.

Keep Your School Fundraiser Simple with a Movie Night

Movie nights are a great holiday fundraising activity for families from your school because you can host them outdoors with minimal investment or planning. With a quality projector and a large lawn space near the school’s exterior walls, you can project any movie you wish onto the side of the school.

Set up can include chairs from the school, or make it picnic-style if the ground hasn’t gotten too cold, and ask families to bring blankets as the night grows chillier. Snacks can be bring-your-own, or you can sell treats that families have made as part of a concession stand to increase fundraising funds. This is a great way for kids to take a break, get outdoors, and for parents to relax, all while helping your school.

An Interactive Holiday Fundraiser for the Kids is a Scavenger Hunt

While families are waiting on their school santa shop gifts, ask them to take part in a scavenger hunt. Once your local area is seeing a lot of Christmas and holiday decorations, have families drive or walk around and look for items on the homes, like icicle lights, an inflatable Santa, a depiction of Rudolph, and others! They can take pictures or cross the items off of a list and submit them after a couple of weeks.

If you prefer to stay indoors, make the scavenger hunt happen online or in students’ homes. Have them submit photos of holiday decorations and ordinary objects around their house, instead. A small fee to enter with affordable, enticing prices can do a lot. Plus, the kids will want to participate and the parents will enjoy the activity.

Consider Cooking Lessons for Your School Holiday Shop Fundraiser

Many school fundraisers include food, dough, and similar items during one season or another. If a member of your PTA or a teacher is a wiz in the kitchen, take your food holiday fundraiser one step further and offer cooking lessons. The great thing is, these can happen online, right over video chat.

You can tailor your food fundraiser to parents with quick dinner ideas and healthy lunch items made in under 15 minutes, or you can make an activity for the kids, like holiday cookies or other fun treats they’ll want to make. This is a great option for every family and provides a skill many people are interested in.

Wrap Up Your Christmas Shop Fundraiser with a Virtual Talent Show or Telethon

Don’t let your holiday shop fundraiser be the last hoorah of the year. Take your student’s talent show online with a fun telethon! Kids can record their acts right in their living room, and you can have teachers or parents provide informative and fun craft projects, educational moments, or comedy sketches inbetween acts.

Think back to PBS when viewers would pledge money and be entertained as they watched the show. You can even note that you will have a parent or teacher complete an incredibly goofy act if certain funds are raised while the telethon is happening, like pouring ice water over their head or cutting their facial hair. Be creative! A lot can happen online.

Your Holiday Gift Shop Fundraiser Can Be More Online

Just because normal fundraising activities are out, does not mean your school is going to lack the proper funds and holiday cheer this year. Use virtual learning and online tools to your advantage, and think about simple ways to keep kids engaged that excites families and parents. With a little community effort, your holiday fundraising this year can go a long way.

10 Tips to Promote Your School Fundraiser

By Coryn Diehl on August 21, 2020 / Holiday Fundraising Tips

how to make promoting your school fundraiser easier

10 Tips For Promoting Your School Fundraisers

Good fundraising ideas for schools aren’t hard to come by — it is the challenge of promoting your new fundraiser that can take some time and planning. By successfully promoting your school fundraiser, you have a better chance of raising the funds you need and getting everyone involved. To be successful with your fundraising promotion, you will want to get your community involved and gain their support for a successful fundraiser from start to finish.

To make the best plan for promoting your school fundraiser, you’ll consider if you’re selling food or toys/products, catering to a younger or older demographic, and what seasonal items are trending at the time of sales. Your traditional school fundraisers, like holiday candles or classic catalogs, are often easy to promote. But if you’re thinking outside the box for high school fundraising ideas or school holiday shops, you may need to get a little creative with how you promote your school fundraiser this season to parents and the community.

We’ve put together some of the best ways to get your fundraising ideas noticed, so your promotion is easy, simple, and successful. Get the best sales this year by following our easy school fundraiser promotion guide.

1) Get the Message Out About Your New Fundraising Ideas for School

If you want your new fundraising idea to get attention, it will require getting your message out to the people you believe will be the most influential. You target audience will influence their friends, other parents, and the rest of the community to get involved. It’s important to find people who are passionate about your fundraising ideas so they will be eager to share the news.

2) Keep a Limit on the Number of School Fundraisers That are Live

No matter what type of fundraising ideas you are hosting, too many fundraisers at once will overburden both school staff and volunteers. You want to keep your fundraising to a minimal not to overwhelm parents who are boosting and selling the items.

High school fundraising can suffer in a big way from trying to run too many fundraisers at once because it can overwhelm students and parents as they attempt to fit different activities into their already busy schedules. Remember, fundraisers should fit naturally into social, educational, and work environments for all involved.

Try to keep fundraisers to two max per season — if Sports and Arts do their fundraisers in the Fall, then have the school run their general fundraiser in the Spring. For families who have kids in multiple activities and social clubs, this balance is key for successfully promoting your fundraiser.

3) Encourage People to Think of Fundraisers as Gifts

When promoting non-food items from your fundraiser, you want to promote your products as great gift ideas for birthdays, Christmas, Hanukkah, and more. Selling your fundraising items as gifts for birthdays, holidays, celebrations, and more, it’s possible to convince people that not only is the non-food fundraiser for a good cause, but it’s a clever gift idea as well that will be one less thing they need to shop for.

Make their seasonal and holiday shopping so much easier by allowing them to buy all their gifts directly from your fundraiser while supporting a good cause all at once.

4) Make Your Easy School Fundraiser a Little More Personalized with Local Promotion

Good fundraising ideas for a school effectively involve the local community and bring people together. Putting a personal touch on a fundraiser, such as gaining a local sponsor or making it clear what the funds are going to, will make people feel more invested and more likely to participate.

When people feel connected to a cause, they are more enthusiastic to be involved. So, promote your school fundraiser by partnering with locals or showcasing directly where the funds are going to in order to improve sales and overall success.

5) Diversify Between Food and Non-Food Fundraisers

If you are used to selling candy bars or promoting frozen food items for your high school fundraising, it’s time to mix it up! Non-food fundraisers can be fantastic fundraising ideas for schools, and offer the opportunity to explore events, gifts, raffles, and more.

Use your resources to think outside the box and see what other non-food fundraisers you can dream up. Promote special offers your fundraiser is offering with all non-food fundraising items. Highlight that you have more than just candy bars or baked goods but gifts and products that are useful and decorative, lasting all year long.

If your grade school or high school fundraiser is a raffle, event, other promotional giveaway, push this announcement so people are more likely invest.

6) Good Fundraising Ideas for School Will Take Advantage of Different Seasons

The time of year your fundraising runs can be especially pertinent when considering what kind of goods your fundraiser will be selling and how to promote your school fundraiser. Certain items are more popular according to different seasons, especially when it comes to food items that are considered seasonal and non-food items that can be given as gifts.

Use all the seasons so your school fundraisers can also coincide with other events in order to take advantage of the community’s goodwill and willingness to contribute to a good cause. The more seasons you fundraise in, the better off your school will be! Make fun seasonal puns, highlight how immediately your fundraising items can be used, and pull on seasonal holidays like Easter, Christmas, Hannukah, and birthdays.

7) Highlight the Benefits of Your Non-Food Fundraising Products

The more creative your fundraising idea is the more enticing it might be to your community. Many people are simply willing to give to a good cause in order to help those in their community, but there are those that want to know that they’ll get a little something for their donation.

Coming up with creative ways to promote your fundraiser can go a long way towards satisfying those that are willing to donate to your cause, as it gives them something new and unexpected that excites them. Don’t just talk about where the money is going but what your buyers will receive and how it makes their life easy.

8) Parent Involvement in High School Fundraising is a Bonus

Parent involvement at any level is important, but when it comes to high school fundraising, often the students are expected to self-start and find ways to earn money for their schools without parent support.

Gaining the support of more parent volunteers makes it obvious that the community is able to stand together and work towards the common good of the youth, even as the youth are expected to follow the example of their community leaders by helping to plan and operate their own fundraisers. Plus, parents can provide more resources and more areas to advertise than students alone. Use a combination of student-led fundraising and parent support in your high school fundraising.

9) Keep Your Fundraising Ideas Versatile and Consider Your Sales Territory

Coming up with fundraising ideas can be difficult from time to time, but there are plenty of sites that can offer up different methods and techniques when it comes to fundraising. Sometimes running the same fundraiser a year or two in a row can work, but keeping things versatile is often preferable since this will offer the community a bit of variety. It’s also important to think about your sales territory and to adjust as needed.

Don’t forget that communities can change and spreading out to other areas could help increase awareness and possibly gain added funding. Always keep your base plan, but don’t be afraid to explore new avenues!

10) Many Good Fundraising Ideas for School Focus on Getting the Kids Involved First

More often than not, fundraisers are held for the benefit of a school, and the kids that attend the school. This means that involving the children should be one of the primary ideas when it comes to any fundraiser. Get them excited in some way by telling the kids what the money will go for, how it will benefit them, and why it’s important that they help to make it happen. When the kids are involved and a part of the process, the community is more likely to support their children to add to their excitement and success.

Wrapping Up

Good fundraising ideas for schools don’t have to be super-complicated or even grandiose in nature, like a bake sale, selling candy bars or poinsettia’s, or even having a raffle that community members can take part in. Many businesses throughout a community will want to help in some way, and volunteers are rarely hard to find when it comes to helping out a local school or charity. Do your research when planning out your fundraiser, and remember the most important part of all, have fun with it. When you are excited, your volunteers will be excited, and promotion will happen naturally.

Holiday Fundraising Tips