I work in an office of about 20, many of whom are working moms.  I sometimes double the dinner I'm making at home the night before and take half of it into work the next day to auction off (via email so as to not disrupt work too much).  Some examples of meals include a square foil pan of a casserole, a caesar salad kit, and cookies/brownies, OR a square pan of chicken dish, another square pan of hashbrown casserole, and a salad.  Basically, I provide something homemade, easy to heat, toss the salad, and you're done.  I've made anywhere from $20 to $50 per meal.  Even just a few dozen cookies to auction off works well, too.

My co-workers also like to get together for potluck lunches but don't always have the time to make something to bring.  That's when I take over!  I've made several lunches that brought in $100 to $175, depending on the number of participants.  I leave the donation up to them but suggest they consider donating what they would have spent if they went out to lunch at a nice restaurant.  The most recent lunch was taco meat in a crockpot, flour tortillas, lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, chips, etc. so they could make tacos, nachos, or taco salads. I've also done fried chicken and other picnic fixings, chicken salad on croissants, sloppy joes, etc.  I'm often asked when our next Relay lunch is!

Hi, my name is Toni Swendson, Spirits of Generations team, Relay for Life of the Northwoods, Eagle River, Wisconsin.

We bus tables at our local restaurants for tips. We make on average $400-$600 on a Fish Fry Night. We put donation cups on the tables and on them it explains that we are working for donations and explains briefly the importance of Relay. Be sure to include on the note that the donations in the cups are not the waitresses tips!!I bought cups at the Dollar Store. We have 4-5 busers, or however many the restaurants asks us to have, we dress in our last year's relay shirts, and then work and have fun!! We advertise in our local paper and place our team banner outside of the restaurant.

We do not get paid for our night of work, but the owners usually will donate as well since they didn't have to pay for busers that night. Also, we do ask the waitresses to split their tips with us as they normally would if there were the regular busers working.

If you have any questions about this, feel free to email me, swennyt@hotmail.com 

I would also like more information and a picture of the "lap trackers". Please reply or email theshaynesfamily@att.net. Thanks

My pastor recently asked me to speak about Relay For Life during announcement time before church. As I finished the talk, I challenged each church member to fill an empty pill bottle with change. Quarters in an average size bottle totalled $12. The size just below that held $9. I even received one of those huge vitamin bottles filled with a variety of change. Last week, I was given an empty seasoning salt bottle with a variety of change. After counting the first round of "prescriptions", we had $65.40. I don't have the total from the last bottle, but I know it's at least $10. This was an easy way for my husband to earn his money toward the team he is working with.

This project only took me issuing the challenge and counting and rolling the change. Several other members have told me they are saving coins for me as well. The response has been overwhelming!!!!!

 

Kathy, RFL of Franklin County, Marketing/Communications Chairperson

I'm Julie Pizzitola, Event Chair for Hemet Californias RFL and Member of team Family of HOPE.

We have had 2 yard sales with donated items and have brought in over $1000 with at least 2 more yard sales scheduled before our event. It's so easy and it's fun.

First you get all your team member together and have them bring over all the stuff they want to sell or get rid of. You'd be surprised of all the stuff laying around your house that you're willing to let go of for a good cause. You would also be surprises as I was, at what pack rats we are...even when we think we're not! ha.

We always hold our sales on Fridays & Saturdays, so on Thursday evenings after we put the kids to bed, we get together for pizza, etc. and organize and price everything. We have fun doing it. We go out and hang signs that night before. We start the next morning at 6 am, usually with people already waiting out side for us to start. It's a busy day, and when you tell everyone it's for a good cause, they don't haggle with the prices...they pay the asking price...most of the time.

Each weekend, we've always brought in over $500 and we put it to our team totals. We've had 2 so far with 2 more scheduled. Once you start telling your friends, coworkers, teachers....they'll all start pitching in items to sell, and are very happy to do it. It's so easy because they didnt' have to write a check or give money which is hard for people sometimes because of the hard times we're all going through, and it cleans out the things they've been wanting to get rid of. It's a great way to fundraise!!!!

All you need is stickers for pricing, markers, poster board, tape, a few tables and a cash box with some $1 and quarters. And a few people to come over and help organize it. It's so easy, I had never done a yard sale before and it was nothing to put together.

Hope this helps someone else make some quick and easy cash for your team!

My name is Sarah, team captain of the Beach Babes in Tacoma, WA

This is a very effective and FUN fundraiser we do every year at the Tacoma RFL (sorry Tacoma teams, this one’s taken!). It’s been hugely successful in bringing in money, but for the people who participate in it, it becomes something to look forward to every year. I now run into people in malls and grocery stores who call me "bead lady" and ask if we are going to do it again this year. One guy chased me down last year as we were setting up to find out if we were doing it that year or not, because his daughter was so looking forward to it, that if we weren't he was going to go to the craft store and buy the stuff himself! It’s become tradition.

Basically all you need is string (a lot of string) and two colors of plastic pony beads. They are super cheap and can be found at any craft store. You need a 3:1 ratio of colors, so if you buy 15 bags of purple, then you need 5 bags of white (for example). I bought them online one year because they were cheaper, but I have decided it’s worth buying at the craft store, so that if you have extra, you can return the unopened bags. Its best to buy them really early, that way they restock by the time Relay comes around, so if you have to send a team member out to buy more the day of Relay, they will have more.

Before Relay we tie a whole bunch of strings, and what we have found works best is to cut the string about 5-6ft long. Then tie it into a necklace (which ends up being about 3 ft long). Then we slip a bead over the “loop” end and have it rest on the knotted end (make sure the knot is big enough to keep the beads from slipping off), in this example we used purple as the main color, so that’s the first bead. Depending on the kind of string you get the “loop” end can get frayed so we like to put a small piece of scotch tape on the loop end, to make it like the end of a shoelace to make it easier to slip the beads on.

We stockpile those, trying to store them so they don’t get tangled, but we usually end up untying all the knots when we get to Relay and always underestimate the number of strings we need, so when we aren’t walking, we are tying strings. Then we put out bowls (usually matching our theme) on the table, one bowl (at least) for each color. And we always get a tent site ON the track.

So How the fundraiser works:
People buy the string (with the starter bead on it). And every time they walk around the track they stop at our tent site and grab a bead (for free). They slip the bead onto their necklace. For this example they would have 3 purple beads and the fourth one is white, marking a mile. The starter bead counts as their first lap, and if they have already been walking for a while, they can grab as many beads as they need to catch up. They take the necklace off, slip the bead over the “loop” end and it rests on the knotted end with the other beads. So it ends up being just one row of beads, hanging straight down. So then at any time during the day, they can look down and count their white beads, and know they have walked 2, 6 or 15 miles.

Last year someone walked 28 miles!!! She needed more than one string.

The mile marking bead for our track is every 4^th bead, because it’s a ¼ mile track and it takes 4 laps to walk a mile. It may need to be adjusted if your tack isn’t a ¼ mile.

It becomes a way for teams to compete with each other….who has the most beads. People end up racing to our tent site to get their bead first. We get to meet SO MANY people every year who stop at our tent site. And it’s fun because our local station shows the entire Relay and its fun when we can see people walking around with our beads hanging around their neck.

It also becomes a souvenir. I have seen people with 2 years worth of necklaces hanging from their rearview mirror, which always makes me smile. Every year, we switch the colors, so they can tell the difference from one year to another.

Last year there were even some ladies wearing their necklaces from previous years.

Price is something you need to kind of figure out. The first year we did just a “donation”. Which worked fine. But last year we stuck firm with $3 each or 2 for $5 and made much more money, we only had one complaint and she wasn’t upset about it, she bought it anyway.

But I think it took a couple of years for it to become so popular, people didn’t care what the price was.

It’s such a huge deal we usually need 5 or 6 team members taking money and selling necklaces at the beginning to keep up.

Last year we made $1500 onsite. I would say $1000-$1200 of it came from the beads, but the Tacoma Relay has a TON of people, so I am sure it will vary from Relay to Relay. You just have to really work hard to sell it the first year, then after that, you just have to try to keep up with the demands the following years. Oh, and I always try to get a tent site in the same area as I was the previous years, to make it easier to find us.

I hope I explained this well enough that other people (not in Tacoma tee hee) can use this fundraiser, if you have questions, feel free to email me doodle7995@hotmail.com It’s so much fun, I can’t imagine NOT selling beads.