Fun Pasta Fundraiser

Hello! I wanted to tell you about the first traditional fundraiser that we did for my daughter's preschool. We worked with a company called the Pasta Shoppe, which sells their products through a fundraiser that they call Fun Pasta (http://www.funpastafundraising.com/).

Product
When you hear the words "fun pasta", you can probably imagine what this product is. Of course, it's pasta - 100% natural pasta, to be exact. And it's fun because of the wide variety of cute shapes that it comes in. There's purses, chickens, Xmas trees, spider webs, ABCs, music notes, ballet shoes, flamingos, footballs, catcher's mitts, and more - 25 different varieties in all! There is also pasta for 27 popular colleges - the pasta is in the shape of either the college's logo or mascot. Four gift sets, three pasta salads, and four pasta soups round out their offerings. Natural food coloring is used in all cases except for the collegiate pasta, which uses traditional food coloring in order to achieve more vibrant colors. Bags of pasta cost $6, pasta salad or soup kits cost $7, and gift sets cost $10. The pasta has a shelf life of 15 to 18 months.

Selling
This fundraiser is especially great for small or cash-strapped organizations because it does not require any money down and all of the selling materials (12 page brochures, envelopes, and 3 sample bags of pasta) are provided for free. The company also pays for all of the shipping costs. This pasta makes a great stocking stuffer or festive compliment to a holiday meal, so I would suggest that you perform this fundraiser before Xmas. For example, I bought some of the soup sets for the great-grandmothers on my Xmas list - since they live alone, these make easy, fast, nutrious meals that they will be able to get at least a couple of dinners out of. I also got 2 bags of the Penn State pasta for a friend of mine whose an alumna of the school.

I would suggest running this fundraiser for 2 weeks. At our preschool, we find that is the optimum amount of time - anything less is too rushed, anything more & parents tend to forget about it.

There is also an incentive program with this fundraiser - for every 12 bags of pasta sold, the seller receives a free bag of their choice. This incentive can actually work two ways. One way is for individual sellers to earn free bags of pasta for every 12 bags they sell. The other way is for the organization as a whole to get free bags. Because all of the individual order forms are summarized on a single group order form (which is faxed to the company at the end of your sales period), you are able to combine sales in order to generate additional free bags of pasta. For example, our preschool was able to get an additional 10 free bags of pasta once we combined all of the individual sales.

Profits
The profit margins for this fundraiser are fairly high, generating some good income for your organization. The profit schedule is as follows:

• Sales less than $2,000: 40% profits
• Sales of $2,000 or higher: 50% profits

Our preschool had great results with this fundraiser. We were able to get over $2,000 in sales, which qualified us for the 50% profit margin. In total, we generated $1,040 of profits with only 26 out of approximately 100 parents participating. When we combined all of the individual orders onto the group order form, we were able to get around 10 free bags of pasta, which we are using as part of the silent auction taking place during our spring festival (along with the 3 free bags we got as part of the selling packet from the company!). So, we'll even generate a little more income from this fundraiser!

I can't say enough about this fundraiser. If your organization is a school or some other group which deals with young children, this fundraiser could be a great fit for you!

Good luck fundraising!
Kara