I often get asked for fundraising ideas for booster clubs, athletic clubs, schools, and sports teams. Of course, the answer is different for each team, but one of the key factors is that whatever type of spirit item you choose to sell, it needs to be fun for the recipient and useful for them (at least useful for that given period of time). I have compiled a list of 20 inexpensive fundraising ideas for your school sports team or booster club that have great profit margins to raise money for your club or team. These spirit items are fun, inexpensive, and generate school spirit. Remember that by getting a business to sponsor the spirit items, they pay for them, and your club can sell them at 100% profit. That is the key to a successful fundraising campaign.
1. Pom Poms - These can be imprinted with your school or team name and can be obtained for well under $1.00 each. Custom imprinted pom poms are crowd favorites and look great in the stands. Fans feel more comfortable cheering on their team when they have some kind of spirit item such as pom poms. Pom poms have been around for years and will be around for years to come as spirit items.
2. Mini Basketballs - Obviously, these work great for basketball teams. You can choose to get either the vinyl mini basketballs or all the way up to tournament quality balls. The vinyl mini basketballs are about the size of a grapefruit and cost around $1.40 or less depending on quantity and are meant as more of a novelty toy for kids. If you feel your fan base will buy full sized basketballs, you can get customized basketballs with your choice of basketball panel colors and multi-colored logos imprinted on the balls.
3. Mini Volleyballs- Volleyball teams can choose from either vinyl mini volleyballs or tournament quality volleyballs. It is important to know your crowd and have an idea of how much money they are willing to spend. There is always the option to take pre-orders for higher ticket items such as tournament quality volleyballs.
4. Mini Footballs - Promotional mini footballs are commonly thrown at football games by the cheerleaders. These mini footballs can be used in 2 different ways for fundraising: a) You can have a business sponsor and put their name on logo on one side of the ball and your school and team name on the other sides of the footballs. With this option, the business actually pays for the footballs and lets the cheerleaders throw the footballs at the games. This helps the team by generating revenue and team spirit from the crowd as well as helping the business who sponsored with cheap advertising. b) You can simply print your school and team name on the footballs and sell them through your booster club to fans. Typically, the business sponsor is much easier and takes less effort. For a typical football game, you want to plan on throwing a minimum of 100 mini footballs, and more for big games such as playoffs and championship games to help keep the crowd going.
5. Mini Soccer Balls- These mini soccer balls can be sold as novelty items to home crowds. The vinyl mini soccer balls are less profitable than selling the tournament quality soccer balls. With full size soccer balls, you can print on every panel for a really dramatic effect. Take pre-orders to avoid being stuck with a large quantity of soccer balls.
6. Thundersticks - Crowds never get tired of thundersticks (or sometimes called thunderstix or bam bams). These thunder sticks can be personalized with a large imprint area. They are easy to sell for $3-$4 per pair, and you can get them for around $1.40 or less per pair. You can print on the both sides of the thunder sticks, so you can get a business sponsor to pay for the thundersticks and sell them to make 100% profit. Thunder sticks have become a standard in any active stadium. These stadium noisemakers bring the stadium to life and helps to encourage the players.
7. Discount Cards - Discount cards are credit card sized plastic cards that have multiple discount offers from local restaurants and retailers. The buyer can usually recoup his/her money after using the discount card only twice. The discount cards are typically printed with about 15 business are 1 side and the school and team name on the other side. Some schools choose to print discount offers on both sides of the cards allowing for more business sponsors. You can charge each business a nominal fee of $50-$100 to advertise their offer. Then you sell the cards for $10 each and make a huge profit. These discount cards are easy sell; they virtually sell themselves if you get some great offers from local businesses. The hardest part is lining up your 10-15 businesses to advertise. This is not difficult though, because most business know that offering discounts brings in business.
8. Stadium Seat Cushions - Stadium seat cushions are another great and traditional fundraising item for stadium sports such as football and basketball. Sponsors can offset the cost of the stadium cushions by ads on the back of the cushion. The booster club can then sell the cushions for $5-$10 to make 100% profit and generate thousands of dollars at a single game. You can sell up to 20 business ads on each side of the stadium cushions. Imagine the amount of money your booster club can earn with the combination of the sponsorship money collected plus the money collected from sales of the stadium cushions!
9. Hand Fans - Sports shaped hand fans are great for games in the South during the beginning of football season. Choose from Football helmet or football shaped hand fans. These fans can be printed with the team schedule, and even a business sponsor name to help offset the cost. Any type of spirit item the fans can hold, such as hand fans, helps make them more comfortable, thus cheering more and louder.
10. Schedule Magnets- All fans need a game schedule and a schedule on a magnet is even better because they won't lose it. Most people will put a magnet on a refrigerator, and think how many times the average person goes to the refrigerator. Fans will buy a schedule magnet, and the profit margins are easily 400%-500%. This will help boost your attendance at games because your fans will always know your game times.
11. Car Magnets - Car magnets with your mascot and team name help to promote team spirit within your community. These are popular with fans because they are easy to remove and cause no damage to their cars. Not only do you make money selling these car magnets, but think how many people will see your team name and mascot on a daily basis. The more people that see you car magnet, the more community support you cultivate.
12. Megaphones - Cheerleaders have used megaphones for years and the the mini plastic megaphones are great for fans to use for cheering for their team. Personalized megaphones are a great way to get your fans loud.
13. Spirit Noodles - Spirit noodles are made of foam and are great to wave around while cheering. These are a great option when noise makers aren't allowed in your stadium. They come in varios shapes and sizes to tailor to your team or school.
14. Foam Fingers - Foam fingers and foam hands come in many different varieties and shapes. There are foam paws, foam talons, foam mascots, and many different foam hand shapes that are great for cheering for your team. These are also great for stadiums that don't allow noisemakers.
15. Sport Horns - Sports horns are unique noise makers that are really loud but come in a small package. These stadium horns take minimal effort to blow and will rock the house and a make a bold statement for your team.
16. Spirit Towels - Spirit towels are classic stadium items to show team spirit. They have a large imprint area and are great to wave around while cheering.
17. Sports Bottles - Personalized sports bottles are great items to fill with drinks at concession stands. The custom printed sport bottles give fans a souvenir to take home after buying a drink. This will encourage fans to buy a drink because they get an item they can keep that is useful after the game. Many concession stands charge an upcharge to get a souvenir mug. If you don't want to use sports bottles, consider stadium cups. Stadium cups are cheap and a great option to use to serve beverages at the stadium.
18. Stadium Blankets - During cold games, stadium blankets are much needed items that are often forgotten by fans. You'll be surprised how many fans will buy a stadium blanket because they forgot to bring their own blanket. Stadium blankets have the ability to generate large profits per sale.
19. Yard Signs - Don't forget about spirit items to promote your team outside from games. The custom yard signs can be sold to fans to proudly display in their yard. These also can have very high profits per sale, and are an easy way to generate large amounts of money in a small amount of time.
20. Hand Clappers - Hand clappers are one of those spirit items that never get old. They make a lot of noise and are fun to use when rooting for your team.
Whatever type of spirit items that you use, make sure they are allowed in your stadium. Most importantly, make sure you do have spirit items available for your fans. Spirit items are the easiest ways to generate team spirit, because fans feel more comfortable cheering when they have a spirit item to use. One important rule to remember is that you don't want to overprice your spirit items. You have to consider the area you live in when determining a reasonable price that the fans will not think is too expensive. School spirit items are easy to sell; therefore, generating lots of money for your school booster club or organization is very easy.
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