Site owners, submit your site for inclusion in our fundraising ideas directory.

Paris fundraiser

by Megan Popun
(Florida)

It all started out in my junior year of high school, which for me was 2002. My best friend had just learned that the school band, which she was part of, had been invited to Paris, France to play at a big celebration. The whole band would have to go. The band consisted of close to three hundred kids. Keep in mind that this was an award winning band. Many of the students placed in all county and all state and the marching band had won many awards as well.

The parents on the committee thought it would be a good idea to sell candles. They grossed a lot of profit and thought it might excelerate the time spent on raising the one thousand dollars for each child. That is not including the parent if they wanted to chapperone.

My friend asked for my help and I obliged. I went door to door in and around my neightborhood on rollar blades no less. It was quite fun and people were then happy to help us out. She also went door to door in her neighborhood as well. We also sold the candles in school and it was really great around Christmas time because the sales really picked up. We had close to a year to raise the money that we needed.

Then the devastating news was broken to the band at practice close to 6 months after we had been selling. My friend came to my house after her practice and told me that they would no longer be going because of the national security threat. The school board decided to cancel the trip because it was too close after 9-11 and they didn't want the students flying to a foreign country. It was very heart breaking but I know we all learned the lesson of hard work and the art form of persuasion.

Once we got our selling techniques down my friend and I sold close to seven hundred dollars worth of candles. She almost had it.

The band instructors told them that the money raised would go to good causes and it did. The band got new uniforms and planty of new instruments with all the money earned.

I found that skating in my neighbohood made a spectacle but also helped me. It was unique and I got many compliments on all of my hard work. We had to learn to over come the no's and try to push them into yes's and sometimes it worked sometimes it didn't. It was alot of fun.