I am posting consecutively so as to not necessitate a "tl;dr". In the above post, I mentioned some ideas that are probably the most lucrative avenues to pursue. In this post, I'll mention some ideas for
supplemental fundraisers (to round out the budget), provide some anecdotes and some general commentary. This one is going to be a little bit longer, but my hope is you (or anyone reading this months unto years later) can find this information to be comprehensive and informative.
If you are interested in your program putting on a secondary fundraiser or two that is simpler, but probably will not make more than $100 on its own, you could consider printing t-shirts, restaurant fundraisers or bake-sales. These are bare-bones ways to raise money quickly that are not too labor-intensive. At the same time, you shouldn't have the expectation that they're going to be huge money-makers to the extent that commission-based agreements or tournaments are. Instead, they're essentially marginal gain ventures whose "success" is contingent on the volume to which they are effected.
Printing T-ShirtsYou could reach out to a local t-shirt printing company, such as whoever Columbian HS does business with for their spirit wear, and approach them with two designs for a "Tiffin Columbian Quiz Bowl" t-shirt. One design could specifically be for the students involved in your program; the other design could be for parents, peers of students and the general public that would effectively be a "Friend of T[iffin] C[olumbian] Q[uiz] B[owl]" (bracketing to account for the differences in which you can choose to brand your program.) You can sell the t-shirts and direct the profits toward your program's budget. I should add, however, that you may not want to stress the purchase of such a t-shirt as being compulsory to your students; if they want one, they'll pay the $15. As an educator, you may have observed that your students who are athletes often will wear their basketball or soccer t-shirts. Branding exists even in high school culture, and I'm sure you might have students that want to represent their club on their chest the same way that the athletes do. If the net profit per shirt is $3, and if you sell twenty shirts between your quiz bowl students and others, that's $60.
Restaurant Fundraisers This is something that we did at FC when I was there to help mitigate some of the costs tethered towards nationals attendances, like gasoline to drive to Washington, that would otherwise get passed down to us, the players and our parents. However, I am not entirely sure to what extent these possibilities exist for other programs in other communities, as we ran ours through the Buffalo Wild Wings in Lancaster (which happens to be one of the few BW3s' in the continental United States that is a franchise and not a corporate location; this may be relevant because I'm not sure if a corporate BW3 would have the provision to sponsor such a fundraiser). If you consider the restaurant fundraiser route, the best idea may be to arrange one with the Buffalo Wild Wings in Tiffin and organize it around a night when the BuzzTime Trivia game "SIX" is played, which is always Wednesday and Thursday nights. SIX is the hour-long game with a four-quarter format that is entirely multidisciplinary with a category for popular culture; it is a different game from "Countdown" which is a thirty-minute game played across fifteen questions. You could approach the management at the local Bw3 and ask if they'd be willing to run a "TCQB Night" where 10% of the profits from sales of food - before tax - can go to your quiz bowl program. And, if you can get bring in ten paying customers on the accord of supporting your program, there could be a $5 gift certificate(s) awarded to the winner(s) of SIX. If you can't get one worked out with Bw3, I am aware that some Chipotle locations across Ohio are willing to sponsor the local high schools' club.
There are some drawbacks to this idea, however. In order for the fundraiser to work, the management will most likely require that any profits to be diverted to your program come on the receipt tickets for customers that present a special flyer for the fundraiser. They are also, likely, going to stipulate that said flyers are to be distributed to your programs' supportive customers
outside the premises of the restaurant. Another thing to consider is, although it might not be explicitly stated when the agreement is reached, you'll want to ensure that the customers employing your fundraiser flyer are tipping at the standard tipping rate (15-20 percent.) You may want to emphasize to your program and any possible customer-sponsors that if the tips aren't coming in at the rate they should be, then the restaurant has to pay that difference to the servers which could be of consequence to the profits earned toward your program. Lastly, it is important to remember that any profits your program were to make have to come directly off of the sales of food; no alcohol. I remember one year when we did the fundraiser, I came across the father of one of my friends (whose son was not in the quiz bowl program) but who came anyways to support the program and support me. He excitedly pointed out that he spent $35 on the night, and when I responded with the enthusiastic inquiry of "wow, that's a lot of food; what all did you get?" he mentioned that he got a burger and "I bought a round of Budweiser's for the whole bar counter. That works, right?" "Mhmmm, it
sure does."
I also do want to note that you can probably expect to make $50 or so out of this on a good night. We only did the fundraiser twice, I think, and we kept running into the same issues that we, individually, couldn't control: people, sponsoring customers and non-sponsoring customers alike, would stay at their booths for two and a half hours (when it would run from 7pm to 10pm) and there would be parties of two-or-three students spread out across six tables instead of four-or-five students spread out across three tables. (N.B. - my accounts of our fundraising experience are solely my observations and conclusions, and aren't in any way indicative nor representative of my coaches' own accounts. I have no idea what they personally thought of the restaurant fundraisers.)
Bake Sales This is self-explanatory. For any school that has a dress code, or more aptly a specific uniform policy, one thing that can be utilized is a "jeans day" or "grub day". One year, our administration was willing to promote a "no-uniform" week for students provided that they pay five dollars, which would be then directed toward our program's budget for Washington nationals (was it for NHBB or PACE? They all blur together four years after the fact.) Does Columbian stipulate that students have to wear closed-toe shoes? Perhaps instead of a "jeans week" or a "no-uniform week", there could be a "flip-flops week" or a "frontal jewelry week" (like how some male students may wear chains or necklaces).
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I like Coach Maupin's methods of getting the private sector, e.g. local businesses, involved in sponsorship. In high school sports culture, specifically football, and particularly in the rural areas, there is an ingrained sense of community pride behind "our town, our team." If Columbian football has some semblance of this within the community of Tiffin, then I'm sure it's not too much of a stretch to possibly get that same sense of community-to-school intertwining as it relates to your quiz bowl program. If a local hardware store is willing to support "our football kids", then maybe you can get support from local businesses for "our quiz kids."
I know that Heath High School's quiz bowl program has sponsorship, to which extent I am uncertain, from their community's chapter of the Lions Club. Their polo t-shirts don the chapter's insignia and members from the chapter will read the league matches that are hosted at Heath.
Bob Kilner coaches travel baseball, which is an activity whose budget is far greater than that of quiz bowl. Maybe he can share some insight as to what has worked for him in fundraising.