I need your creative minds!

Well, this isn't something that is quick, but it sure is easy! If you start on it now, you're likely to have a fair amount of change by the time you need it, and it keeps on going and going and going. The best part is that it doesn't cost any of your members a dime! I found this when I started fundraising for my Susan G Komen 3-day walk. What you so is tell all the members of the congregation to save their ink cartridges/toners. Tell them to save the ones from work - with their employers permission. Go to the local businesses - accounting firms, law firms, title companies, doctors, whoever uses a printer and/or copier. This place called Funding Factory will PAY YOU for them! (As long as your church is set up as a valid non-profit organization). It doesn't cost a dime for you guys, everyone's using ink now-a-days. The postage is even free - they send you mailing lables. Check them out on the web (they're easy to find but I don't want to post the link or it might voilate the TOS here and we don't want that!). If you do sign up, can you use my referral link - 127466. Best of luck to you all!!!

A club I sponsor at school raises a bundle every February. We make Hershey;s Kisses roses. They're easy and inexpensive and really beautiful. You probably know how to make them already, but I'll go through it, in case. The materials are nothing but Kiss candies, cellophane, straws and plastic or paper leaves. The straws should be green or as close to the stem of a rose as possible. Gle a leaf or two to one end of the straw Put the Kisses bottom-to-bottom, and wrap them in cellophane, leaving a tiny tail on the cellophane at the top. They really look like rose buds about to open. I still have the first one I made to show the kids how, and it's many, many years old. It's still lovely. We've sold them for $1 to $3, with a discount for anyone who wants to buy a bouquet.

In February one year our Youth Group decorated giant heart shaped sugar cookies and delivered them, on order. I do not know how much they charged per cookie, but it was fun to do, and basic sugar cookie dough is not expensive to make. People loved receiving the cookies and the cards. Someone in your church who is musically talented could deliver singing telegrams for a fee. No cost except time, there.The ideal thing is that these items fit the Valentine theme but do not have to be sold as gifts to your congregation, only. It is a way to reach out to people in the community.

My Pastor did not believe in fund raisers, because he said that if each member brought their tithes and offerings the way they should there would not be a financial problems. Well we had our church renovated, and the realization that the offerings were not enough hit home. So now we are having fund raiser projects. We have had a hugh garage sale, each member donated items to sale, probably like your bizarre will be done. We have sold cookie dough, candles, in September we are having a gospel concert. At one time we were thinking about a fair, but that became too costly. We have had "Men who cook", which was all the men of the church would make a dish and bring it in, and there would be a donation given by each person who attended. We have had raffles, but that is so generic and most people hold on to the tickets and do not sale them. Maybe you can have a movie night, charge a small amount for entry and sale refreshments. Since my church recently started fund raisers I do not have many suggestions. But I wish you well and hope you are successful in whatever you do.

Well in our church there would usually be a rummage sale of items that are not needed anymore by the parishioners. I think by accepting donations for a rummage sale by your church goers then selling ti might generate funds for your event

have a comedian come in and charge 5 bucks/person thats wat i did

well are you looking to having something that people will want to buy? Are you looking for donations to auction? Auctions are usually pretty fun, and work best in the winter time, to have a dinner with stuff to auction is always something that is fun. You can have it catered and charge people a fee for coming to pay for the food or what have you, get all sorts of great donations for auctioning off and make some money that way. Or you can have a bazaar or go to a bazaar and have like some sort of bake sale - bake sales are always fun and you can get a lot of people to bake treats for selling. I have participated in bake sales at the churches, we were able to talk with the church and make sure we would be the only table with baked goods. We always made a good portion of money for that. I have been in auctions as well, I would be in charge of contacting companies to obtain donations or even just talking with the church members that have businesses or the like, if you are also have a school tied with the church you can do selling of candies or even do some searches on the internet for great ways to fund raise. There are tons of things you can do, with the ages you are dealing with I think that having an auction may be your best bet. Our Church has an auction every year and it is always outstanding. They raise a lot of money with the auctions.

Our church has about 50 active members. We have a youth group that sometimes needs to raise funds for trips, camp and so forth. What they do is have a valentine banquet that is for everyone in the church along with friends and family. The tickets generally run $5.00 per person. The food is donated and the young people do the serving. Of course it is expected that they receive tips too. This is really looked forward too every year. There is a number of people that play interments so love songs are sung. Everyone is able to give some kind of tribute to their spouses parents and kids or different members of the church. As I said it is a big hit every year. It doesn't even have to be right on Valentine's Day.

You say it's a small church, so not sure what kind of space you have available, but you might think of 'hosting' a scrapbook Crop Day. Most crop days charge $30 - 50 per person. And if it's like the small church I was a member of in Texas, maybe some of the ladies could make some baked goods, salads, sandwiches, and you could serve coffee, tea, or sodas. Keeping the expense to a minimum. Figure out how many tables you could set up for workspace, normally 4-6 ft table is needed per person. If any of your members scrapbook and have any of the tools such as cricut machine, cutting tools, you could set up a work station for those who attend to use. If you decide to do this type of fund-raiser, check your area for yahoo groups/scrapbooking, one be one way to get the word out with the date, etc. Also, if you have a bake sale, check out your local walmart, if you have one, they match any funds raised for non-profit groups. We did that a couple of times for our volunteer fire dept. Good luck

youdontsay hi whats wrong with an old fashioned bake sale with cakes, cookies, and anything in the pastry line and along with each pasty item a handwritten recipe from the maker, make enough of these for each cookie etc. this makes it' more unique that way and charge a few cents for' each hand scribed recipe. lol.

I heard of another church that gave every man, woman and child in the church $10 and asked them to try to double it and bring it back to the church on a specific Sunday. The kids were thrilled to be involved. They bought craft materials or materials for art projects, then sold their crafts and art work. Adults did that same thing or bought ingredients to make home baked goods and sold them. I believe they were given a month to try to double the money, and when the time came, they actually collected 4 times what they had given out.

You'd be surprised what a church can do. Our church in Florida had about 200 members, and most of them were elderly and on a fixed income. I think our regular offerings were about $1,000 a week. But we planned for a miracle Sunday - many months in advance - with a goal of getting $20,000 on that one Sunday. Because it was months in advance, everyone had time to make things and sell them, to have garage sales and put the money in the miracle Sunday offering. They also had time to reach out to friends and neighbors and tell them about our miracle Sunday. When the day came, everyone came to the altar with their extra offerings. Children came with handfuls of pennies - or with money they made selling lemonade. Adults came with the money they made from making crafts or having those garage sales...or from collecting money from their friends. And some people brought titles - to their old car, to a small lot, and to a boat. We collected something like $20,004 in cash and checks, and when the car, boat and small piece of land were sold, it was more like $25,000. Meanwhile, another church down the block also had a miracle Sunday that same day. They had twice as many members, and set their goal for $100,000. They also achieved their goal. And both churches made the local newspaper - front page in the religion section.

Well you could always do something like a spaghetti-night or something similar.. Or what I always liked was some sort of lottery.. You could make it a family day, and all have to pay like 5$ to enter, the winner gets like 20% or so the second 10% and the third 5%.. In order to win you need to do some tasks, like running a course, throwing eggs to your partner and don't break too much off course.. You can let them enter as a team like father-son.. IT could bring the familys together too and is real fun to do and to see :)

I am not sure but I hear telavengelism is pretty succesful with the fund raising.

The church I used to go to had talent shows. You could do that. That seems to generate a lot of profit.

Raffles are always good. Sometimes you can get chain stores like Wal-mart to donate items for the raffle. Then your congregation can sell the tickets to their friends, family and coworkers. That would bring in money outside the congregation. Too cold for a carwash in Feburary. Maybe something to do with valentines day--a raffle for a romantic dinner for 2 or something? Candygrams? Singing valentines? These are just a few off the cuff ideas.

These are all really great suggestions. Thanks everyone who posted and the you dont say for a great real life queation.! Adios. :)

Before I volunteered in our church. We ask people who are going to our church to donate even in small amounts. They put it inside cans, you could use a jar or a piggy bank if you want to. Also I think, making something and selling it could help. try selling foods and put a sign that tells that the money that you will earn from the business will go to "Name of your church". If you have kids in your church, ask them to make anything they can think of using polymer clays. then bake it and sell it. try those two in one business, that could help you earn.