Tag Sale a great success!

Today was the day of all the big fundraisers. It was a half day and there were going to be four main fundraisers set up - chili sales, tag sale, bake sale, and raffle tickets. Since I was the one who came up with the idea for the tag sale I was also one of the people who sat at the tables to help sell the items.

Oh and you better believe that when we first unloaded the items onto the tables in the back of the school today during break, there were A LOT of items. Each of the three tables was packed full with items of all kinds - books, stuffed animals, household items, kitchen utensils, gardening tools, and anything else you can possibly imagine, and when I took a step back and looked at all of the tables, it was hard to believe I wasn't in someone's attic. The amount of items and the space everything took up was overwhelming. I was worried that people wouldn't want to buy those types of items, that nothing would get sold, and the whole tag sale would have been a waste of time, given how much preparation and thought it took. I didn't want to leave today feeling like all of our effort was a waste of time.

Luckily, the end result was the exact opposite. Of all four fundraisers held today, the tag sale made the second-highest amount of money, with chili sales first of course. I went to the tag sale tables immediately when school let out, because parents were to be coming in right away to talk to their kids' teachers. As parents started coming in, we (Emily, Marissa, Deanna, Kiki and I) began to sell items for the prices that they were marked, depending on their colored tags, with an occasional dollar-off or buy-one-get-one-free here and there if giving a bargain meant the difference between the item being purchased or not. I feel that if we did not do this, people would have not bought as many items, and that a dollar off here or there made all the difference. I learned one of the secrets of selling items - it's better to sell more for less, than to not sell the items at all and sell fewer items for more.

At some point (around 4:00), we had sold at least half of the items on the tables. I didn't realize it until I stepped back and looked at all of the tables and realized that there were so many less items than when we had started out, and the whole area went from looking like a messy attic to a gift shop. It was now that I realized that we had to sell as much as we could in the next two hours and that meant giving items for free if necessary or even charging only $1 for an item or a group of items. Whatever could sell more items and get them out of our faces so that there would be less to cart off to the swap shop later, the better. I also tried to tell the customers that they could have a number of items and tell me what price they thought was reasonable, and I, in a subtle way, tried to convince the customers they needed specific items. "Oh, what a lovely Christmas gift for someone special!" or "Would you like to buy this as a gift for your son/daughter?" were not uncommon to be heard today. This worked pretty well, and by the time the day ended, only about 1/4 of the original amount of items remained, and Mrs. Botsford came and took as much as she could for her theater class, for free.

At the end of the day, around $250 was made! I was proud to see that the tag sale was more successful than originally anticipated and that a lot of items WERE sold. It felt good to know that something I had spent a lot of time planning and trying to make successful had actually been successful. I am glad that I in some way contributed to prom, but of course I can't take all of the credit because everyone who helped today did an excellent job and was just as committed as I was, and I commend their efforts sincerely. I was also glad to see that I can be trusted with responsibilities and that I am able to be responsible for something and to commit to it, because to be honest it was difficult at times to make sure posters got printed and hung up, that items were moved and tagged, etc, because it took up a generous amount of time to prepare. But I like having responsibilities and commitments because it lets me know that I am capable and that I can handle having a lot on my plate and not end up crushed by the pressure and workload. Most important to me is that I helped to make prom a better place, because how boring would it be if prom was just like any other school dance? It has to be special and as the prom committee it's our job to make sure it's en event to remember :)