Don’t ever question whether or not Candy Fundraisers Can Raise Lots of Money. They can, they do and they will continue to be a great fundraising product.

We just came across an article in the Statesmen Journal. A group of people really had a passion for their library. In fact they needed to raise around $800,000 to build a new library. Now that’s a lot of money and few people would consider candy fundraising as an option.

But here is a snippet of their story from the newspaper:

“Many might have doubted it could be done. But many Bunco games, flower sales and candy fundraisers later, members of the Friends of the Jefferson Public Library have raised $100,000 in a little more than a year to build the town a new $800,000 library. And this dedicated group of volunteers is committed to raising the total amount due without subjecting the town’s residents to tax increases.

“So how did a dozen committed volunteers raise so much money in a small community for a library with an annual operating budget of $76,250? “Begging,” said Karen Barr, Friends of the Library vice president. “Literally, we beg,” grant writer Linda Baker added, smiling but absolutely earnest in her resolve.”

There are lots of lessons for us all in this story. The most obvious is that people who believe in a cause can raise lots of money. In fact they can raise more money than many of can imagine. And they can do it the old fashioned way. They can do it with product fundraising.

The real story is that a group of people identified a need they believed in. They formulated a game plan on how to satisfy their need. They were committed to their goal and they had pride in their effort.

Does that describe your fundraising group? Do you have that passion? That focus? That determination? If not then maybe that explains why many groups produce lackluster fundraising results.

Let’s talk about how to choose the best Lollipop Fundraising Companies. It is one of the easiest fundraising products to purchase so a quick discussion should tell you all that you need to know.

Fundraising lollipops are more or less a commodity in the fundraising industry. There are only a few manufacturers that produce lollipops for fundraising. However most manufacturers do not sell directly. Instead they sell through Lollipop Fundraising Companies or distributors of their products. So you are really choosing a distributor first and then the specific lollipop you would like to purchase.

When you buy fundraising lollipops you will be asked to purchase them by the case. Most lollipops come in cases containing 640 lollipops. That might sound like a lot but remember the lollipops sell for only $.50 and you pay half of that amount so a typical case will cost you $160.

One of the first things you should consider regardless of the shape or type of lollipop you purchase is whether the distributor includes free shipping in their price. A case of lollipops weighs around 40 pounds so you can imagine how expensive shipping would be if its not included.

The next decision is the type and shape lollipops you want to sell.

There are lots of great shapes to choose from and we suggest you change shapes periodically to keep your sales fresh. But the fact of the matter is that the most popular fundraising lollipops are the 1 oz round confection lollipops that come in variety of flavors.

Here are the 3 Lollipop Fundraising Companies we suggest and links to their lollipop fundraising pages:

Easy Fundraising Ideas lollipops

Fast Track Fundraising lollipops

Buy for Charity Fundraising lollipops

There was a time that Candy School Fundraisers were the most common way to raise money. But that’s changed over the past few years. There’s a few reasons why it is not as common. Some are valid and some not so much.

The biggest reason there’s been a reduction in candy school fundraisers has been school districts that determined youth obesity was caused in part because kids were eating too much candy. Part of their solution was to ban one of the easiest ways to raise money. After all candy fundraising offers products that are extremely affordable and well received. And even though only a small portion of candy sold during the fundraiser was actually consumed by the students many districts felt compelled to appear to be taking action.

Another reason that candy school fundraisers started shrinking was that the candy bars being sold were also shrinking. At first it was rather startling. Hershey fundraising candy was offering bars that were sold more inexpensively in vending machines. That is no longer the case. Hershey got smart and created a larger candy bar for their fundraising products line and it corrected the dilemna of discount stores selling candy cheaper than the school could purchase candy for.

Finally lots of schools chose to avoid candy fundraisers because they had to commit to a certain amount of candy. Pricing was based on the number of cases a school purchased so the tendency sometimes was to overbuy. The mistake was not intentional. It was just hard to accurately predict sales. And if you got a better price for buying a few more cases many people tended to error on the high side. But that meant that there was unsold candy which would seriously eat into profits.

Interestingly, though, now that there are few candy school fundraisers being held it might make more sense now to hold one. After all there is not the competition there once was and the fact of the matter is that most people eat candy bars now and then.