Prescott High School selling cotton candy to fundraise for their dance team
When it comes to dance costume budget tips, the best advice we can offer is to contribute more to your team's budget with fundraising! It’s a great way to help pay for your team’s expenses, and a little goes a long way.
Have your team work together to plan and run their fundraising efforts for ultimate team bonding! Plus, there are always a few great life lessons along the way like teamwork, customer service, and budgeting. Here are 18 fundraising ideas for your dance team's next event.
1. Auction or Raffle Night
Gather donations from local businesses to auction off at a special event! Sell tickets for a cocktail night or special presentation where the auction will occur, and let attendees make silent bids on the donated items. It's a win for you and for the guests who get the winning bids!
2. Carnival or Haunted House
Get together with other sports or dance teams in your community and host a carnival night at your school. Sell tickets to friends, family and advertise within the community! Raffle tickets are a good way to get attendees to play games, win prizes, or gain admittance to special tents like a fortune teller or face painting.
3. Field Day
Similar to a carnival idea is a field day! Find a big open outdoor space like a sports field or park, and get you team together to run activities for kids. Three legged race, egg drop race, obstacle course, kick ball and other sporting games are all ideas for activities. All you need is outdoor space and some sporting equipment. Charge an admittance ticket, or ask local businesses to sponsor the event!
4. Kid’s Clinic
Put together a children’s clinic for the younger dancers in the community - participants pay to attend. Your team can teach the kids dance skills through a workshop or series of classes. The kids can then perform a dance they learned at your school's football or basketball game in conjunction with your team.
Green Bay Southwest host a Kids clinic in their community, working with their future team members to develop skills!
5. Team Newsletter/Program Ads
Create a team newsletter or program to send out to friends, family, community members, and schools. Reach out to local businesses to see if they would be interested in advertising in your newsletter, and feature those sponsors in the newsletter. Team members can write articles to contribute to the newsletter!
6. Showcase Event
Do what your team does best: dance. Host a showcase event with performances by your team, or invite other dance teams to participate in an invitational! Sell tickets for friends, family and community members to attend, and sell ad space in the program for an added bonus. Think of it as a dress rehearsal too - it's a great way to get prepped for that next big competition!
7. Volunteer at Your Stadium
Many sporting venues will let your team work concession stands to earn dollars. Others will donate for easy clean-up jobs like sweeping or picking up after a game. Instead of paid hourly wages, the money will usually go directly to a fundraising account accessed by the team.
Green Bay Southwest gets together as a team to pick up and sweep Lambeau Field every year, in order to raise their dance costume budget!
8. Restaurant Night
Many restaurants are willing to host fundraisers where a percentage of their sales on a given date and time will go towards your team. Your team does the advertising to get people into the store and buy! Contact your local fast-food restaurant and see if they have a fundraising program, or check out this list from Soapboxie on 56 Restaurant Fundraisers for Non-Profits!
9. Gift Cards
Another way restaurants and businesses offer fundraising opportunities is by selling gift cards. Buyers get 100% percent of the money they pay for the gift cards, but you place an order for the gift cards at less than face value. Depending on the organization, you could earn 2-13% of what you sell! Work directly with a retailer like Kohls, or check out fundraising websites like Shop With Scrip that offer a variety of gift cards in one location! This idea is low on overhead, and high on value for the buyer of the gift cards.
10. Your Team's Signature Sale
Selling product like popcorn, wrapping paper, or cookies is a classic way to raise funds. The key to success here? Pick an item that you can't get everyday and is something worth spending a little extra money on. One of the reasons Girl Scout cookies are so successful is that you can't get them every day, they are universally noted as delicious, and there are a variety of cookie options to appease a range of tastes. Find the perfect product for your team's sale, and the annual event with become something buyers will look forward to, instead of an obligatory money drain!
11. Team Apparel
Make t-shirts with your team's logo to sell to your biggest supporters: parents and fans! Many t-shirt shops have online ordering systems that will let you designate a certain extra percentage that can be used for fundraising. Or, try the DIY method and find a talented group of moms or performers that could create a custom item like scarves or blankets!
12. Car Wash
A fundraising idea list would not be complete without the classic car wash! Get your team together, contact your favorite gas station, and make an afternoon of it in the summer. All you need is soap, towels, a few enthusiastic poster holders, and a lot of elbow grease!
The Green Bay Southwest Dance Team at their Car Wash!
13. Bake or Craft Sale
In this age of DIY renaissance, create your own Renegade Craft Fair or farmer's market-esque bake sale! The key to success is foot traffic and quality goods. Tap into the talent on your team and find those moms or dancers that know how to make the best bars or can make some quick and easy jewelry! Get the most sales out of the event by hosting it on an occasion where there will already be a lot of foot traffic. Examples include your school's basketball game or a Saturday multi-team soccer practice in the park!
14. Swap Meet or Rummage Sale
If the Marie Kondo bug has hit your team's families like it has at The Line Up, chances are there are a lot of odds and ends around your house you'd like to get rid of. As the saying goes, one man's trash is another man's treasure! Advertise the event as a multi-family rummage sale for the most visitor appeal, and time the event when people are most likely to be out at garage sales - Thursday, Friday and Saturday mornings!
15. Duck Derby
A unique fundraising idea recently came to us through Capital Ice Synchro - they host a Duck Race annually! The skaters sell "ducks" in the form of raffle tickets to individuals and corporate sponsors. A race is held where they purchased rubber ducks float in a lazy river at a water park, and the first one to finish wins! The prizes were quite impressive: airline tickets, a diamond necklace, and $500 cash!
The team also sells corporate sponsored ducks, which are decorated and float down the ahead of the other ducks, to promote the businesses. The skaters vote on prizes for the decorated ducks, like Best Dressed (winner this year was Your's Truly, The Line Up)! It's a fun, kid-friendly event!
Winning ducks at Capitol Ice Synchro's annual Duck Race event, for the Coolest Duck, Best Constructed Duck, and Best Dressed Duck!
Photo credit: Capitol Ice Synchro
16. Grocery Store Food Stand or Bagging
At our local grocery store in Eden Prairie, there is a Brat stand that we've seen many teams working in the summer months (including the Eden Prairie Pom Squad!). Team members can donate their time selling discounted hot dogs, bratwurst, pop and chips to people on their way into the grocery store. Add a tip jar for an extra bonus from generous patrons.
Another way team members can earn cash is to volunteer their time bagging groceries. Both these tasks - bagging and food stands - are easy enough that anyone can be successful!
17. Bingo or Games Night
Everyone loves a good bingo or board game, even kids! Raise funds through admission tickets, selling bingo cards or raffle tickets, and solicit donations from local businesses for prizes. Advertise the prizes as incentive for participation.
18. Ice Cream Social, Pancake Breakfast, or Spaghetti Dinner
An off-shoot of the bake sale, pick an occasion when the whole dance team can get together and cook for friends and family. It's a great opportunity to get together in a fun and family friendly environment, as well as get a good meal out of it! Host in a park pavilion, your school cafeteria, or the neighbor that has the biggest yard on the block!
Whether your team is small or large, hopefully you've found something that can work for your group! The key is to tap into your team talents as well as your community's resources. But most of all, have fun while fundraising!!
Looking for more costume budgeting tips? Check out our free download below : "19 Tips to Get Your Best Costume Ever On A Budget"
