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The Sweet Success of Candy Fundraising

by Debbie S.
(Delaware)

I've been involved with only one fundraiser in which candy was sold and that was for my son's eighth grade trip to New York City. They decided that instead of simply asking their parents to chip in for the money needed for transportation, food and show tickets, they'd sell candy during the school lunch period to help raise some or all of the necessary funds.

We chose to sell homemade candy items including lollipops, chocolate covered pretzels and simple homemade chocolate truffles. Our theme of "Chocolate Makes the World Taste Better" was chosen because the costs to make these items and the effort involved was very low. We had excellent parent response since there really was very little energy expended to make these items and transporting them to school was easy as well.

The students made posters that were put up around the school, they sent home flyers announcing their promotion and cause, and they even had a contest where someone won a candy-making kit. The more you bought, the more tickets were entered into the contest. A parent offered that prize up since they had received it is a Christmas present and had no use for it.

We had many parents who already had molds for making chocolate lollipops and we got a great deal on chocolate since we were buying in bulk from the local craft store. That kept our costs low so that our profit was great. Most of our items cost between .50 and 1.50 (for the truffles). We also offered a recipe card with the truffles and the girls involved in making those were able to gain Girl Scout credits towards one of their badges.

All in all, selling and making chocolate for a trip to New York was a sweet success.