Great Posts- thanks for contributing- how do you work your school nights and how many do you do?
Thanks!
Pizza Dolphin writes:
Great Posts- thanks for contributing- how do you work your school nights and how many do you do?
Here are the steps:
- Print up a flyer describing your school night.
- Call the targeted school and ask to speak to the person in charge of fundraising (be prepared for any questions about your school night if that person is there).
- Usually (90% of the time) the fundraising person is not there. I’ve come to the conclusion that the reasoning behind this is to put up a wall to catch some of the flack from fly by night fundraising companies. So, the following day, hop in your car/truck/van/Hummer/Ferrarri and drive out to the school and speak to the secretary. Give her a brief overview of the school night and while you’re speaking, make sure you’re extremely positive in your tone.
- After about a day or so you’ll usually get a call from the fundraising person. Sound upbeat. Let them know that the only thing they’ve got to do is pass out the flyers and have their teachers push the pizza party idea. (The pizza party goes to the class that orders the most pizzas. <~ This is your hook).
- Once you’ve agreed on a date (let’s say the 30th) you’ve got to e-mail your contact a copy of the flyer. For me, e-mail is the preferred method of communication.
- Two flyers go out. One exactly a week before the fundraiser. The other the day of the fundraiser, so make sure you get the e-mailed flyer to your contact three weeks before the school night so he/she can get these printed on time (they pay for printing).
- Get your crew worked up and excited about the night. Turn it into an event at your store.
- On school night, put out your bucket on the carryout counter to collect the flyers and make sure you have plenty of prep.
- You’ll probably start getting hit right after school so make sure you have staff coming in earlier than usual. Most orders will be carryout, but you will generate additional deliveries.
- Proceed to get your butt smashed for the next 2-4 hours.
- At the end of the night, count the slips and the totals and e-mail the results (in paragraph format) to your contact letting them know how awesome their school is and how awesome they are for doing this. Then give them the numbers.
- I give them everything: Total students, total orders generated, turnout percent, sales generated, donation to the school, winning class, second place class, third place class, and total orders from these classes.
- Get a check cut quickly and have it to them by the beginning of the following week.
- While presenting the check, let them know you’ve got to do this again and you want to make it a regular thing. Already come prepared with preliminary dates for the rest of the year (once per month).
You also asked how many school nights I’ve got.
At this moment I’ve got 4 that I’ve already done at least once. I’ve got 4 more on my military base that are scheduled for the 22nd, 23rd, 24th, and 25th of January (I’m going for a record week that week) who will be first timers. I’ve been working on them all school year until they finally said yes. Now they’re all excited because they’re in this little military wife click and their kid’s schools are competing against each other.
I also have an interesting one that is almost done. This is a school who actually contacted me. It’s about 10 miles outside of town so it’ll all have to be carryout or dine in. I gave her the whole rundown on how school nights work out but she threw me a curveball. She told me her school was partnering with their local paper and they were going to do a write up on the front page describing their school night. Instead of just the parents of the kids ordering, she wants the entire town (800-1000 residents) to have the opportunity to order and have us donate sales based on the towns participation. I’m a little nervous about this one because in all my years I’d never heard of this before. I’m also a little nervous because I think I’ll get absolutely spanked if I do this. My ovens can only handle about 80-90 pies per hour.
So anyway, that’s the rundown on how these things work. I hope this is good information for you to use in your store. Also remember… these school nights generate phenominal sales on those designated nights, but you’re also creating new customers that would’ve never tried you before. However, the biggest goal is to get into the hearts and tummies of the kids. It’s like the McDonalds approach: get to the kids and they’ll grow up with your restaurant and pass the pizza habit down to their kids. That’s where you create customers for a lifetime. -J_r0kk
Hi J_r0kk
really helpful post could you tell me the basis of the flyer i.e. what deal do you offer the customers and the school?
thanks
Kevin
kev writes:
really helpful post could you tell me the basis of the flyer i.e. what deal do you offer the customers and the school?
Actually Kevin, no deals are offered. The flyer we send to the school specifically states that on this night, no coupons will be honored so that we can maximize the school’s donation (which is 20% of net sales).
Thursday night is PIZZA NIGHT!
Take the night off from cooking and help raise funds for Junction City Middle School! Thursday night, November 16th, order Delivery, Dine In, or Carryout from Wheat State Pizza and Wheat State will donate 20% of its sales to Junction City Middle School. Sorry, on this night sales will be based on regular menu prices and coupons will not be honored so we can raise as much money for the school as we can.
Make sure you fill out the information section at the bottom so your student can be counted.
Why does your student want to be counted?
Because at the end of the night we tally up the orders and the class that has the most WINS A FREE PIZZA PARTY! That’s right! Just order pizza on Thursday and your child could win a FREE PIZZA PARTY compliments of Wheat State Pizza!
So remember, on Thursday night, November 16th, leave those leftovers in the fridge, leave the pots & pans in the cabinet. Let Wheat State Pizza do the cooking for you!
Student’s name ________________________________________________________
Teacher’s name ________________________________________________________
Order total <$ >
ok so I’m interested!
I assume the 20% of net sales is only in realtion to the sales linked to the school coupons?
What do you supply for the pizza party?
In the UK we’re currently having major debates about ‘healthy eating/child obesity’. So many business are staying away from targeting kids indeed we now have a ban on foods high in fat sugar or salt advertising with tv linked to young people. Whilst I in the US pizza and schools seems to go hand in hand have you any general comments about how to handle this?
Kev
Actually same thing going on in the US…new rules dictate that during school hours most foods (including pizza) can not be sold even for fundraising purposes. They removed all soda machines also. We used to raise about $8k per year for a HS club that sold our slices to kids on there way on the bus every day after school, but that got axed.
As far as fundraiser nights I think you are good to go though no?
Kev
We are having the same here in Western Australia. Only last week we had a front page main story in our main daily newspaper from a Professor of “know it all , but knows nothing about reality” coming out with a push for a 15% Tax on “junk food” which he included all forms of take away food.
The obesity problem is getting really bad in Australia with us now rated No: 2 in the world behind the U.S. and the media is making huge mileage out of it and run big stories front page.
For us to go out and push for school participation would be like crawling blindfold across a major freeway.
It’s a shame because it is a real win/win concept, especially with the cutbacks in Education spending over the past decade. Ironically these cutbacks have forced schools to cut sporting programes to meet costs, which in turn has accelarted the obesity crisis.
Dave
Just for laughs and giggles check out this sight http://www.pioneerthinking.com/aicr-pizza.html . I have had the Healthy eating discussion with the school officials and seem to be winning the battle as they are now serving my pizza in 6 of the local school canteens.
First, our Deluxe Pizza has the 4 food groups. Dairy (cheese), Grains (crust), Veggies (Onion, Green Pepper, Mushroom) and Meat (Pepperoni and Ham) Sounds like HEALTH FOOD!!!
One thing I did was take J-rokk’s suggestion of making a competition out of it and twisted it a bit. We have the school give out flyers on Monday. We have school nightS Tue AND Wed. On wed morning I e-mail a FOLLOW UP flyer telling everyone what the standings are and that tonight is the final night to see who wins the Pizza Party. Sales are about double for the school on the second night. Kids go home and tell Mom or Dad that they jsut HAVE to order so there class can catch up or stay ahead of the others. This is unbeleiveable for response and we have gained several regular customers out of it. They all get Thank You cards and then get on our monthly mailer list. It has been a HUGE success for me!
So Thanks j-Rokk. I took your idea and ran with it and then fine tuned it for me. If you are gonna be at NAPICS I ow you a drink!
We have the school give out flyers on Monday. We have school nightS Tue AND Wed. On wed morning I e-mail a FOLLOW UP flyer telling everyone what the standings are and that tonight is the final night to see who wins the Pizza Party. Sales are about double for the school on the second night.
Oh you capitalistic pizza shop owner… I LOVE IT! Fantastic idea! You are a visionary entrepreneur indeed. Good job!
I just want you guys to remember one thing:
These ideas I’m putting out to you people are not my own. Honestly, I don’t think I have the capacity to come up with an original idea to save my life. These suggestions I’ve been putting out in the forum are all things I’ve learned when I was growing up in the pizza biz. I want everybody to remember that because knowledge IS power. The more you have, the more successful you’ll be. Remember this fact later on in our little pizza world when you have a newbie who needs help. Don’t be hesitant to offer assistance because it would be a terrible shame to have all this knowledge and not pass it down to anyone. We’ve got to keep this sharing of ideas approach alive because there are a lot of independents out there who will truly need the help in the future, whether it be raising sales, starting up a new shop, having a problem with obtaining starting capital, or whatever.
It’s my approach that the more successful independent operators we have in this world, the better chance we have going up against the big boys because we’ll change the mindset and the eating habits of the general public one customer at a time.
There is strength in numbers ladies and gentlemen. That’s a fact. So go out there and get your sales up and open more stores. You’re helping everyone, including me, by doing so. -J_r0kk
Another great and poignant post j_r0kk.
Your valuable input has helped me greatly as a newbie to the pizza industry.
Thanks and to all keep the info flowing as we all learn and grow by it.
WOW! Thanks J. You know that is the first compliment I have gotten in the whole time I have had this store (a little over a year now) I have a newsletter I am working on to send to my database. Would you mind if I e-mailed it to you to check out. It will be in MS Publisher format. Please let me know. Thanks!
Whats up Jrock I gave out about a 1000 menus (6 hours) with coupons (doorhanger) The first day we received a big order from it Thanx again Ill be doing that once a week. And Im thinking about trying that school idea. But what if they have a pizza place that they deal with already?
Thanx again
up23 writes:
Whats up Jrock I gave out about a 1000 menus (6 hours) with coupons (doorhanger) The first day we received a big order from it Thanx again Ill be doing that once a week. And Im thinking about trying that school idea. But what if they have a pizza place that they deal with already?
Thanx again
That’s AWESOME! Well tell me. Don’t leave me in suspense. How’d you do last week? When did you get the doorhangers out?
As far as the school nights are concerned…
Those things work, they get you in great with the community, they create new customers, they create more sales, etc. However, like I told you, hold off on that. Let’s tackle one thing at a time. Right now your entire focus in life is DOORHANGING. I want you to think about how you can get more doorhangers out every waking hour. I want you to eat, drink, sleep, dream about, and think about doorhanging. This is your meal ticket and your key to success in life for the next couple months. Get the word out and let everybody know who, and where you are. Your goal is to have everyone in town knowing you, your place, and your food.
Another thing… I’d better be the first one you call when you break a $1,000 night or I’ll be pissed! -J_r0kk