Pizza fundraiser ideas

Fundraising with pizza is a great idea for most any size group. It provides your buyers with something everyone wants, and can be very profitable as a fundraising idea.

There are three different types of pizza fundraisers:

Sales of pizza by the slice

Sales of pizza fundraising discount cards

Sales of pizza supplies - make your own kits

Each of these fundraisers varies in effort, requirements, and profitability. Let's take a brief look at each one.

Pizza Fundraising By The Slice

This is a quick and easy profit source for just about any type of youth sports team. You purchase your pizzas at a quantity discount and have them delivered piping hot to your event.

Papa Johns and Dominos both offer the delivery service from any location. Of course, you'll need to pay cash when the pizzas are delivered.

Sell the individual slices at close to 100% markup so that your team receives $2 for every $1 in cost.

That markup covers any unsold or damaged slices.

Tips: Don't overbuy, reorder instead. Also, sell them fast before they cool off. Plain cheese is the most popular followed by pepperoni.

Pizza Fundraising Discount Cards

A pizza fundraiser card is a discount card with an offer tied to a single merchant, usually a national chain. It often provides a two - for-one offer on every order and is tends to be priced at $10 for a card good for a one-year period.

Offers vary with most being tied to either a single location or a small group of outlets for a national chain. Pizza Hut cards are good for eat-in dining while most others are aimed at the take-out or delivery market.

Given how popular pizza is with younger children as well as teenagers, pizza cards are excellent school fundraising ideas.

The cards for Pizza Hut and those for some of the other chains place a limit on the number of times you can use the card, often 21 times. That is a lot of free pizza for $10. Usage is tracked via holes punched in marked spots on the card.

Some of the offers also specify that your initial order must be for a large pizza while your free pizza is a medium size. When you think about it, that works well for most adults because they usually want a different set of toppings than what their children enjoy.

Profit Tip: Pizza cards can be obtained from many suppliers. Most offer the same set of national chains and prices can vary widely, so it pays to shop around.

All in all, pizza cards are among the best easy fundraisers based on profitability and ease of sale.

Fundraising Sales of Frozen Pizza, Supplies, or Kits

Little Caesars and several other companies offer a "do it yourself" pizza kit that many schools, youth groups, and sports teams have successfully sold.

The basic concept is the same as a cookie dough fundraiser. Your sellers use an order-taker brochure, collect payment upfront, and deliver the goods after you receive your bulk shipment.

As with all order taker sales efforts, there is slightly more work involved than with immediate sale items. The delivered product must be received, counted, and sorted by customer.

Pricing is generally close to the price the customer would pay at retail. Profit margins are in the 30%-40% range.

Tip: Because the dough is frozen, deliveries need to be timed well. Your customer pickup/delivery needs to take place within 4 to 6 hours after your bulk delivery.

If you are looking for a great fundraising idea for your school, youth group, or sports team, try pizza this year!

How to build and manage a successful fundraising team

For larger fundraising projects you should put together a team to help you otherwise you will be stretched far too thin and stand a good chance of failing. The ideal team from a cost perspective is volunteer-based but you might have to occasionally hire someone especially if it’s for a specialized task that most people can’t do.

Many people dread being asked to volunteer and do so begrudgingly but you will be surprised at how many people you ask will be more than happy to “roll up their sleeves” and pitch in for no other reason than to help out a good cause.

The best people to approach in building your fundraising team should be individuals or groups that are sympathetic to your cause. Example: Parents with players on the football team have a vested interest in helping the team get new uniforms.

Others are just naturally giving in their time and are usually involved in several projects at once. If you can land one of these types of go-getters on your team they often have the drive and ambition of several volunteers.

To find volunteers just use common sense. Try the people that are tied to the cause first and build from there. You might consider placing ads in your local grocery stores if they have free Community Bulletin Boards in the entrance and exits. Another idea is to approach your local paper and see if they will donate a small ad for you to use to find help.

Talk to your prospective volunteers and tell them exactly what you are trying to accomplish and what you would expect from them in terms of time and effort. It’s a good idea to have some type of fundraising plan drawn up that you can show them as this not only shows that you are organized and serious but they will also be better able to see how the time and skill requirements fits into their schedules and abilities.

Training should be done by you or someone that knows the exact role the volunteer will be performing and you want to be sure to thoroughly go over any tasks and duties they will be performing so there are no misunderstandings later on. Be careful to not talk down to them or lecture them. Remember, they are giving you one of their most precious resources, their time, so respect that and them as a person and you will go far.

It is important to match the task with the person when making job assignments. You probably wouldn’t want someone who is an expert in selling to stuff envelopes when they would be more valuable and happy working the phones trying to solicit donors.

If you are working from an office environment be sure and make it as pleasant and comfortable a place as you can. Easy access to snacks and drinks (maybe provided free by a generous donor?) should be available and any other creature comforts you can add will be most welcome.

If it’s a long project you might want to consider some type of event for reaching a milestone. This would of course depend on your budget but it could be something as simple as bringing in pizza to celebrate.

Always keep an eye out for overwork and stress. People that have volunteered want to help you so respect them and if it looks like they are being overwhelmed it’s time to bring in some more help. The key idea is to keep them happy and wanting to continue to help rather than feeling like they are stuck because they are too polite to quit.

Be sure and give praise and say thanks often to each and everyone of your volunteers. Let them know how appreciative you are of their help.

Keep an eye out for any personality conflicts and work swiftly to resolve them. This might be something solved easily like relocating someone to another part of the office or it might mean asking the person to leave. Don’t be afraid to do this if you have to because you ultimately are responsible for the group as a whole and the success of the project falls on your shoulders. Be a leader!

Follow these simple steps, communicate frequently, respect and thank your team often and you will find that your fundraiser will be a great success!

Fundraising ideas for your next fundraiser

Here are four keys to better nonprofit fundraising results.

Non-profit fundraising is all about multiple streams of income, so how do you make more money for your organization?

Simple. When you put together your annual plan, you need to include as many ways to raise money as possible.

So, you're probably thinking: 'That's easy for you to say, but how exactly do I go about it?' Easy! You just have to be "smart" about it, with a well thought-out plan that doesn't make too many demands on any one facet of your organization.

Every fundraiser that you conduct places various demands on your volunteers, your supporters, and your leadership. Those demands can be time consuming, expensive, and stressful.

The more large-scale fundraisers you conduct in one year's time, the greater the load you place on the people you depend on.

You need to be 'smart' in how you go about your fundraising.

Four Keys to Non-Profit Fundraising:

Think Smart

Plan Smart

Work Smart

Be Smart

Non-Profit Fundraising - THINK SMART

Thinking smart means taking the time to review past results and strategizing about how to do better this year.

If you don't spend some time brainstorming some new and creative ideas to increase your bottom line, how are you going to rise above last year's results?

Define your three best income streams. Now, daydream a little about what changes or enhancements you can make that will add additional volume to those streams.

Non-profit fund-raising is all about reaching more people with a compelling message that inspires them to take immediate action to assist your organization.

How can you reach more people? By exploiting two things - personal networks and personal motivators.

Your non-profit fund-raising has to be structured to achieve maximum leverage of everyone's self interest by providing sufficient incentives for giving time or money to your cause.

How can you make your message more compelling? By giving it 'story-like' visual imagery that speaks to your supporters emotions.

Decisions are made on an emotional level, not a logical one. A 'story' allows people to visualize their contribution having a positive impact on what they've visualized.

How can you inspire a higher percentage to immediate action? By combining your story with a call to action.

A call to action leverages the immediacy of the emotional reaction to your story with a request to help now BECAUSE their contribution will have a positive impact.

Everyone wants to help. They just have to be properly coached about your situation and motivated to act now.

Non-Profit Fundraising - PLAN SMART

Planning smart means taking concrete action to put your ideas into an annual business plan. Yes, I did say 'business plan.'

No self-respecting, non-profit fund-raising organization should be without a written business plan to guide their fundraising efforts.

Your plan should spell out roles and goals along with detailed instructions on how you'll get there. It should be grounded in the past and targeted at the future.

Each non-profit fund-raising activity should be broken down into the necessary action steps that will produce the highest level of results with the most cost-effective effort.

Everyone should know exactly what's expected of them. A well-organized team where everyone understands their role is able to execute their mission flawlessly.

Everyone should know and be able to state your group's value proposition.

If they can't articulate, in two sentences or less, a convincing reason why you are raising funds, then you need a plan that helps communicate your message more effectively.

Non-Profit Fundraising - WORK SMART

Working smart means taking your plan and putting it into action with an eye towards getting the most bottom line results from every facet of your organization.

You'll get the best long-term results if you stay focused on not overburdening your volunteers, your supporters, and your leadership. Overworking volunteers will ensure that many will not be around to help next year.

Too many demands for small donations will alienate your group's supporters. Structure your non-profit fund-raising requests to two or three campaigns in a year's time, no more.

Size those non-profit fund-raising campaigns to get the most from each time your supporters are asked to make a contribution.

Continuous fundraising will wear out your leadership as well. Your key personnel will be spending most of their time on organizing and conducting campaigns.

You want to keep everyone fresh and motivated. Do that by having a well thought out plan that maximizes the value of everyone's time, energy, and contributions.

Non-Profit Fundraising - BE SMART

Being smart means taking the time NOW to begin a 'Get Smart' effort about your non-profit fund-raising efforts.

Start the brainstorming process now.

Get a small journal and start recording any and all ideas you have, day or night, about improving your fundraising. Some of them will be duds, but others will be gems.

Sure, the gems will be rough and will need polishing, but you won't have any gems at all if you don't let your creative juices run wild.

Just write them down as they occur to you and keep adding to the ones that make the most sense in the light of day.

Hey, if it worked for Edison and Einstein, it can work for you.

Start writing down all the ways that you can think of to create multiple streams of income for your organization.

Get your non-profit fund-raising planned and organized, then watch the money flow in.