Have people think of your school every time they see a candy bar.
It’s not hard to like candy bars. Wouldn’t it be great if people thought of your school every time they had or saw a delicious candy bar? Using fundraising with candy bars to build your unique niche while serving your school can be fun. Some people call this co-branding.
Follow these five tips on how to use candy bars for fundraising to grow your school’s brand:
1. Decide what you want to be known for.
Do you want everyone to know you have the highest test scores in the county? Or that you have the best fans supporting your sports programs? The most diverse culture? Decide what makes you stand out and what you are best known for in your community. This is what you want to focus on to build your brand.
2. Find a candy bar that matches your image.
Does a bar with lots of nuts match you? Or an intense one, like dark chocolate? Think of candy bar characteristics and find some you can relate to. Satisfying? Complex? Smooth? If you need ideas, here are five unique qualities that fundraising with candy bars have that your school or group can pick from. It doesn’t have to be perfect – your creative genius will go a long way! That’s the next step.
3. Tie the two together.
Now you get to be creative. Have a contest! Who can create the best slogan that brings together the concept of fundraising candy bars to the image you want people to have? “Smart, intense, and a Tiger” for maybe a dark chocolate bar. “We’re nuts over Tigers!” for a nut bar. “Inspiring, creative, and complex – we are Tigers!” for a chocolate-covered peanut and nougat bar.
Or, help us create a “peanut-free zone” at our school if you want to raise awareness about the growing concern about peanut allergies in children by selling candy bars without peanuts.
There’s a lot of fun to be had here. Reward your creative people with a small stash of the candy bars once the sale is over– they will be your best spokespeople when sales begin!
4. Create helping marketing material.
Maybe you’ll need to add a sticker to drive the message home. Check with the company supplying your candy bars for fundraising to be sure there is no infringement on their marketing by doing this. But even attaching a bar to a page with your message will work. Just keep the message and the candy bar together.
You can get creative here, too. Can your school mascot be added somehow? Can you come up with complementary decorations for the concession stand? You only need consistency, and we have school fundraiser event pointers that can help. Keep the message and some essential graphics the same. It’s too easy to water down a message when hundreds of people do their own thing to sell it. Impress upon your sellers the importance of consistency.
5. Be sure to sell to people who buy into your message.
Figure out who your best buyers will be. If it’s sports fans, they will be at the games. If you’re touting your diversity, get in front of social clubs and activities. If you’re branding your academic prowess, your teachers and administration will help, and many parents, too. Know where to find them and go to where they are. At the same time, some will seek you out (and many do), but most do not. You have to find them.
Author Bio
Clay Boggess has been designing fundraising programs for schools and various nonprofit organizations throughout the US since 1999. He’s helped administrators, teachers, and outside support entities such as PTAs and PTOs raise millions of dollars. Clay is an owner and partner at Big Fundraising Ideas.
