Easter Raffle Fundraising | Fundraising Directory and Ideas

How can we make the most of Easter Raffles?

Easter raffles are a common fundraising phenomenon in Australian schools and clubs. We were recently sent a Facebook reader question asking how to encourage more support for ticket sales. The responses were full of amazing ideas (because our volunteer community is amazing of course), certainly worthy of being shared here.

Here is some feedback about how Easter raffles can be run:

Nicola:

Hi we just had our Easter raffle today and made $1700 we have a small school (350 students). The kids all brought in an Easter egg/bunny as payment for a mufti day that was held a few weeks back and we raffled them off. We had 26 baskets bursting with eggs etc. 6 tickets were attached to a letter sent to every family $10 for the 6 tickets or $2 each. We drew the raffle out today during the Easter hat parade and it was a hit!

Danielle:

We have just shy of 700 kids. All families are asked to donate Easter eggs or Easter related stuff (decorations, party ware, activity books etc) over a period of 2wks and our volunteers collect donations from classrooms each morning (kids get 1 house point each day they donate). Then all donations make up the prize baskets/gift bags (we had 45 this year), and sell tickets for $1 each every morning before school to parents, students & staff for the 4 days before the draw. We don’t send books home, we have trestles set up in anywhere from 2-4 locations around the school so we catch as many people as possible as they do the morning drop off. It works better for us that way as people will drop by with their spare change each day or make an impulse purchase rather than having to actively respond and action something that’s sent home. We sold over 1,700 tickets this year.

Bronwyn:

Did you buy your prizes? We used to get all the kids to donate an egg or rabbit (anything really). The kids really wanted to win their own back. We had large prizes and a lot of smaller ones so the chances of winning were very high. All the ticket money was pure profit. It was a good money maker!

Cassie:

We are a small school of just over 100 kids. We ask each family to donate an egg. We do 3 major prizes and then about 20 small prizes. If you by a full book of tickets it is $4. We do quite well from this little raffle. I think keeping the ticket price reasonable helps. We also have a group of our grade 5/6 who help with the making up of the prizes which saves on the adult volunteers. We have also done a ticket sellers prize so if you sell the full book and return it by a certain date you can go into a book sellers draw to win a prize.

Dee:

Hi, our kinder only had 70 students and we made just over $700. We sent out a booklet of 24 tickets ($1 per ticket of 6 for $5). We did ask for easter donations from the kinder families and successfully gained 7 gifts donations from local businesses (play centre entries, animal farm, miniature train passes etc). In total, we gave away 28 prizes.

I did send out flyers, post on the kinder website, did a Fundraising notice board to remind of fundraising events and a reminder fundraising flyer. Reckon we did well since we doubled the funds raised from last year.

Here are some ideas about maximising ticket sales:

Jo:

Do you promote what you’re fundraising for? Maybe the school community is disengaged if they don’t know what your goal is ie new air conditioning, shade sails, etc? Also, maybe offer a prize for the highest ticket seller ie a voucher to a family attraction – hopefully one that you can get donated?

Michelle:

Perhaps have non-chocolate prizes. A lot of people are getting chocolate overload. I only bought one ticket in our school Easter raffle. We already have too much Easter chocolate in this house and my kid doesn’t like chocolate. I know Easter = chocolate but I don’t want any. Also, being a short term, perhaps the families just don’t have the spare cash? Still recovering from Christmas, school fees, uniforms etc

Bernadette:

We send home 5 tickets per student ($1 each). Kids donate an egg each (any brand and size). We have 1st-4th prizes for each class. We have prizes for most tickets sold. Each class has their own raffle with better chances to win a prize.

Deb:

We made ours a competition for students. Senior and junior who sell most get a movie ticket.
Then it put the work and motivation for students to do it, instead of parents.

Anne:

I met with Anne last year, who told me about the Easter raffle her school runs.

As with many examples above, students bring in donations of eggs and bunnies to make mini hampers. The main difference is that each individual class will make their own set of prizes and run separate raffles.

All money raised from each class goes to the teacher as a contribution for extra class resources such as reward stickers and anything else that the teacher may need (we all know that most teachers end up out-of-pocket due to their generosity!)

Anne said that their Easter raffle was very well supported because parents could see a direct benefit to the everyday learning environment for their children.

Inspiration

For those who love a bit of visual inspiration, we have collected some fantastic images on an ‘Easter Raffle’ themed Pinterest board. Check it out here. I don’t know about you – but I just love those orange smarties done up as carrots!!! Of course, I couldn’t help myself and have done my research about where you can buy single coloured Smarty-type lollies – see here 🙂

Regulations

Easter Raffles will almost always fall into the category of not requiring permits or strict regulations. For more information on what the raffle rules are in each State, click here.

Mandy Weidmann is Australia’s ‘Fundraising Whisperer’ – publisher of the Fundraising Directory and author of the Practical Fundraising Handbook for School and Club Volunteers. Mandy believes that parent volunteers shouldn’t have to reinvent the wheel all the time and is passionate about providing resources to make fundraising easier (and more fun).

Follow the Fundraising Whisperer Facebook page to take part in great information sharing with Australia’s school and club volunteers.

Originally published 30 March, 2018