Discover a Delicious Way to Raise Funds with Our Cookbook Fundraiser!

[Leigh0725]

Typcial MondayYeah so this is the second time I've called HO and the hold time was 20+ minutes. Since I work in an office that is really quiet, I try to get away to call. It's a conversation that I would rather not have folks around me hear. Not that it's a bad conversation. ;-) I will try to call on my way home.

 

[chefann]

LibrarianChef - thanks for checking into that for us. I guess there will be a lot of us calling in to get details.

 

[Leigh0725]

In addition to emails, I have two new calls into a supervisor and manager of HO. I had their direct phone numbers, but when I called in I got voice mail. But...I have to say that I've heard through the grapevine from someone else who called in that this idea is being shut down completely. Field services basically said that if they got a large order for primarily cookbooks, they won't likely fill the order--it's at their discretion.

UPDATE...
Okay, I'm a little bit speechless. I just got my own phone call back from the manager over the solution center and I got a different answer. They really like the general idea of a cookbook fundraiser, were even impressed with the outlined list of how to do it without breaking policy, but the way it's being talked about on ChefSuccess doesn't follow company policy and procedures. She said she contacted her supervisor and apparently there's been talk between departments on how to respond to callers and emailers. So I got a lot of information on how to tweak the plan to follow policy. It requires a bit more paperwork and time and it's not as huge of a profit as we were expecting, but it's very doable and still FAR better than the 15% we normally give. But based on the changes in the plan, we can't guarantee anything above 15% even though the amount could soar to far above 40-50% based on donation amounts.

I know its frustrating to have to call in, but there were several points of change that have to be done and word of mouth tends to mess the interpretation up. BE SURE to write down the name of the person you talked to, the date, the time, and notes on what you asked and what they said. That way when they call you about your order (once you submit an order for like 1,000 cookbooks), you can give them specifics on how you conducted your fundraiser/cookingshow and who gave you approval.

Just one of the differences was that every single customer must be on a separate order--no combining orders, just like at a regular show. This change is extremely important because if someone is ordering more than one or two cookbooks, it could mean an investigation. I think they're watching this idea like a hawk. They want it to succeed, but also want there to be NO misunderstandings. I wouldn't be surprised if they actually contact several individual customers on each of our orders to discuss the fundraiser and donation amounts (or contact us if we don't include contact information on individual customers).

I specifically asked if she could please send me the plan we discussed IN WRITING so that when I relayed it to everyone here, I wouldn't be inserting my words or my thoughts accidentally. She said that they're at the phones ready to answer any consultant's/director's specific questions on the "cookbook fundraiser" (or she said it's not an official cookbook fundraiser, but a fundraiser that includes promoting primarily cookbooks) and that she would appreciate it if I didn't relay their answer. I know, it sucks, but I feel like it's important that every person call in specifically to get "clearance." She said the answer will depend on your question. And I get the feeling that they keep track of who is calling, but I may have been off there.

Oh...another thing, they're alerting inventory so that quantity won't be a big concern.

Okay, so what if one child sells 10 cookbooks? I can understand the need to put down orders to work with shipping, but I would think that there would be an easier way to combine some of the orders so that you can still donnate $4 of the $5. How is it different than if two or more people at a show combine their orders to one big order?

 

[PAMPEREDCHEFBELL]

That's how I was going to do it too. It would be easier for me and the organization to submit each order by student. That student could sell 1 or 50 cookbooks. Who knows. For tracking purposes, it just seems better that way.

 

[Carlee Spradlin]

So, what's the number we should call to get specifics? It's not the 888-our chef is it?
Thanks for all your help!

 

[LibrarianChef]

LibrarianChef - thanks for checking into that for us. I guess there will be a lot of us calling in to get details.

They want a head count of who all is going to do this. My director just called in after I did and she said they told her they're logging each and every call today. You really do want to have their "go ahead" on file.

TIP: I wouldn't call it a cookbook fundraiser, but a fundraiser that promotes primarily cookbooks. And I WOULDN'T say that you were going to charge $15 per cookbook. Try to let them do the talking and fill you in on the finer points.

Okay, so what if one child sells 10 cookbooks? I can understand the need to put down orders to work with shipping, but I would think that there would be an easier way to combine some of the orders so that you can still donnate $4 of the $5. How is it different than if two or more people at a show combine their orders to one big order?

I can only speak from what difference I would see after speaking with them, but I'm not speaking FOR HO. At a show, two people who are best buds might get together and decide to combine their order knowing that one of them won't get a receipt and won't have a donation receipt for their income tax filings. They have, what, 30 days to decide if they like the cookbook? And if they don't then one of them might grab their friend and ask to borrow the receipt so they could get their money and tax back. But on a fundraiser, if you or the organization gets all of these bulk orders and randomly put several people under one receipt (based on who the teacher/student is) without the cusomer's knowledge or consent, you've robbed customers of an official receipt and tax deduction.

Furthermore, in regards to combining orders, there IS a concern of shipping on this fundraising idea. If WE the consultants are taking shipping money from each order at our discretion instead of letting each individual person decide how many cookbooks they are ordering for their $4 shipping, then we're mixing up the rules of the game and working them toward our (or the company's) advantage without the consent of TPC.

I'm actually amazed they're letting this fundraiser happen and they're even PREPARING for it to happen. WOW! I totally expected a big fat NO when I called today. If this goes well and we can all follow the procedures, then who knows what will happen next September. It would be incredible if this were to become a "thing."

 

[KellyTheChef]

And might I add...that if there are a ton of people who TAKE ADVANTAGE and stick it to PC and not charge enough shipping, you can bet your bottom dollar that this could be the LAST we ever see of cookbooks on sale.

We need to think of HO's point (paying to ship all of these) and the customers point (needing a receipt for tax reasons)

 

[chefann]

Actually, the customers won't have anything to write off on their taxes. When purchasing a product as part of a fundraiser, you can only write off the amount paid that is over and above the retail price. Since the cookbooks are usually $14.75 plus tax and shipping, customers aren't spending any more for them than they would normally and therefore have nothing they can write off.

 

[ChefBeckyD]

Actually, the customers won't have anything to write off on their taxes. When purchasing a product as part of a fundraiser, you can only write off the amount paid that is over and above the retail price. Since the cookbooks are usually $14.75 plus tax and shipping, customers aren't spending any more for them than they would normally and therefore have nothing they can write off.

And speaking as someone who has bought TONS of Girl Scout Cookies, and Boy Scout Popcorn....and filled out my name and products on a sheet very similar to what was attached to this thread - I have NEVER received a receipt from any of the munchkins selling. I can't see where we are "robbing" people of a receipt. And when was the last time you returned anything you bought as part of a fundraiser? Something like our stones, or other warrantied products - I can see the need then - but for a cookbook? Hmmmm..... (and I'm not trying to argue - just the thoughts that are wandering through my head right now!)

 

[chefann]

I had those exact same thoughts, Becky. I've never gotten a receipt for a FR purchase from nieces, clustermate's kids, etc.

and I didn't want to stir up trouble with my previous post - just point out that there are specific tax guidelines when people purchase a product as part of a fundraiser.

 

[Leigh0725]

BreakdownOkay, so what I was thinking: enter an order for each student. So if the student has five cookbooks ordered (let's say for parents, neighbor, grandma, etc...), there would be one receipt per child. I can recall when purchasing cookie dough or frozen pizzas (or even girl scout cookies), you don't receive a receipt.

The school is willing to print out receipts with their letterhead on it with the note to contact me if there needs to be an exchange or refund. I don't mind doing this part of the work since I don't anticipate the need to do many exchanges or returns. If there are 200 kids participating, then there would be $800 for shipping. I honestly don't forsee kids selling more than 10 cookbooks. We'd like to see each kid sell about 5 books. If for some reason there is a child that has a lot of books, I don't mind splitting that into two orders. I just cannot phathom having to enter 800+ orders. Due to our tax rate being higher (7.525), I figured that we will need to charge $16 per book, have $4 go to the school and $2 go to tax and SH.

***I still need to get nitty gritty details from HO, planning to call them on my way home tonight***

 

[chefsara]

I have a Cub Scout leader that has asked about doing a fundraiser for their pack. If she has it in September and the cookbooks are the guest special and there are a lot of the guests that order, say for Christmas or birthday presents, will this throw a red flag to HO so that they will contact guests or host about why so many cookbooks are ordered? I have never done a fundraiser yet in 2 1/2 years with TPC. I am afraid that that would scare some folks away or give TPC a tainted view if they are calling to see why a person bought several cookbooks. Any comments?

 

[LibrarianChef]

Actually, the customers won't have anything to write off on their taxes. When purchasing a product as part of a fundraiser, you can only write off the amount paid that is over and above the retail price. Since the cookbooks are usually $14.75 plus tax and shipping, customers aren't spending any more for them than they would normally and therefore have nothing they can write off.

Well, without getting into the nitty gritty of all the new rules for this fundraiser, it's kinda hard to respond. But from the way I was shown how to document each purchase on their receipt, they would see exactly what their donated amount was. Even one cookbook would render a donation of 30 cents if they paid $15 per cookbook in my state. But for those who buy multiple books for Christmas gifts, that's when the donation amount gets important.

John Smith bought 3 cookbooks:
Cookbooks were $30
Shipping is $4
Tax is 7%=$2.10
Donated amount is $8.90
TOTAL PAID= $45

Sally Jones bought 10 cookbooks:
Cookbooks were $100.00
Shipping is $4.00
Tax is 7%=$7.00
Donation amount is $39.00
TOTAL PAID= $150

At the end of the entire fundraiser we should be able to tell the company how much they're receiving in actual donations (we can't say $5 per cookbook because it's different per order), how much they've received as donation from TPC (15%), and how much of our commission we're donating.

This is why we can't promise anything more than 15%, too. They're assuming that many, many orders will be for only one or two cookbooks. So that's only a few cents extra per order. But for those few people who buy 3-5 cookbooks, that will pump up the profit amount a bit. We just don't know HOW much until we take all of the orders.

And speaking as someone who has bought TONS of Girl Scout Cookies, and Boy Scout Popcorn....and filled out my name and products on a sheet very similar to what was attached to this thread - I have NEVER received a receipt from any of the munchkins selling.

I don't believe Girl Scout Cookies or Boy Scout Popcorn do their fundraisers with a donated amount. Usually there's just a set amount for each box when I buy them. I'm not agreeing to donate an amount IN ADDITION to the regular price of the item. If TPC were a regular fundraising company then they would do this a different way. But on our receipts we must tell everyone how much their donation amount is. We can have cheat sheets fixed up for parents/students to carry with them that tells them how much for 1 book, 2 books, 3 books, and so on.

I can't see where we are "robbing" people of a receipt. And when was the last time you returned anything you bought as part of a fundraiser? Something like our stones, or other warrantied products - I can see the need then - but for a cookbook? Hmmmm..... (and I'm not trying to argue - just the thoughts that are wandering through my head right now!)

Sorry, don't shoot the messenger. I totally understand.

I imagine many of you are getting a better explanation on the phone than what I'm allowed to give. It may seem ridiculous when explained in bits and pieces like this, too. I just know that every buyer has to be given a real receipt with warranty printed on the back and donation amount included in the write up. And part of this is definitely ensuring consultant accountability. We're required to disclose everything up front to the customer--every person knows EXACTLY how much they're paying in shipping and EXACTLY how much they've donated and they'll know EXACTLY how much they'll get back from TPC if they decide they don't want their book or if the binding breaks during their warranty period. If we told them it was $4 in shipping per book, that's essentially lying. And if we combine orders and shipping ends up being cheaper for them than what we quoted, we're lying. Does any of that make sense? :blushing:

They told me that we may not under any circumstances combine orders for this fundraiser and every single person must receive a receipt for their own order. Once TPC sees how this goes this could very possibly be a continual thing. But I wouldn't be surprised if they contact several of the companies after the fact and ask them how they liked the fundraiser and asked about any problems in procedure, etc. They could simply approach them under the guise that this was a new fundraising option and they wanted to make sure everyone was pleased and understood the procedures for taking orders, etc.

I can recall when purchasing cookie dough or frozen pizzas (or even girl scout cookies), you don't receive a receipt.

I believe those are all fundraiser companies without warrantied or guaranteed products. So there's no need to prove that you bought from them. That's the difference, from what I understand. TPC has a level of pride in their products and policy mandates that every customer have a way to return their item for 30 days or 1 year or whatever the time-frame is for each product.

Again, I'm just relaying what I understand. And there's more to it all than this, obviously. I should probably log off and encourage everyone again to call HO for details and approval. I know that the other way of doing this would have been much more profitable, but this is the only way for TPC to legally do this.

 

[abrahamlaur]

do we just call the 1-888-Our-chef number and speak with whoever answers? or do we need to speak with someone specific or a specific department?

 

[LibrarianChef]

do we just call the 1-888-Our-chef number and speak with whoever answers? or do we need to speak with someone specific or a specific department?

Yes, select #3. I only spoke with a supervisor and manager because they've worked with me on other issues so I happened to have their direct phone number. But they said after being made aware of what was going on, all of their reps are equipped to answer questions about this fundraiser.

 

[melissalough]

So, I just called HO 1-888-687-2433 and asked if I could do a fundraiser that mainly promoted the cookbooks in Sept. She did put me on hold for a few minutes and came back and said yes. No questions asked, no explaination...nothing. Just a plain yes. I even repeated myself when she came back on the line, and again she said yes. Did I call the right number??? Seems like those who have called about this have received more detailed instruction.

Melissa

 

[abrahamlaur]

awesome, thanks ... i'm going to call once my daughter goes to bed so i can pay attention to the conversation rather than half on them, half on my daughter LOL

 

[LibrarianChef]

So, I just called HO 1-888-687-2433 and asked if I could do a fundraiser that mainly promoted the cookbooks in Sept. She did put me on hold for a few minutes and came back and said yes. No questions asked, no explaination...nothing. Just a plain yes. I even repeated myself when she came back on the line, and again she said yes. Did I call the right number??? Seems like those who have called about this have received more detailed instruction.

Melissa

That's so aggravating! They're thinking: Well yes, you can just do a normal fundraiser that promotes cookbooks in any month. In September you'd charge $10 per cookbook and the company would get 15% if they sold $600 worth. That's a normal fundraiser. But it's the additional donation amount that they'll have to talk you through for legal purposes. For example, that order form we all downloaded off here with each cookbook listed at $15 is a no-go. It has to be far more detailed than that detailing every penny.

Ugh, I hate it when they just wait for you to ask the right questions. My director talked to them for a long time today and said there are all sorts of legal things they're having to be careful of. When consultants call in, the reps can't SUGGEST the idea that you ask for a donation amount or even assume that's what you're calling about. They have to assume only what you tell them and they're assuming you're talking about a normal fundraiser. And you probably had to sit on hold forever, too. :yuck:

I'm sorry I suggested to keep it short and simple. In a nutshell, they know we have to get special approval to do anything other than a normal fundraiser, but they can't ask if that's what you're calling about.

 

[abrahamlaur]

do you suggest something specific we ask? heres what i'm thinking of asking ...

is it possible to do a fundraiser that is primarily for cookbooks in sept. where the school will ask for a donation on top of the sale price?

do you think thats okay to ask?

 

[LibrarianChef]

do you suggest something specific we ask? heres what i'm thinking of asking ...

is it possible to do a fundraiser that is primarily for cookbooks in sept. where the school will ask for a donation on top of the sale price?

do you think thats okay to ask?

That *should* get you the answers they're waiting to give. Because no matter how we look at this, we'll be dealing with donated amounts--especially if someone buys more than one book.

 

[krzymomof4]

My mind is twirling from all of this. I don't understand the "donated" amount and why this is going to be different from a regular fundraiser with the guest special cookbooks as the main or only item being purchased. Can someone explain it to me like a 3 year old, please :
I have a terrible migrane today and stuff is not making sense like I know it should and I definately want to be on the list.
TIA

 

[KellyTheChef]

My mind is twirling from all of this. I don't understand the "donated" amount and why this is going to be different from a regular fundraiser with the guest special cookbooks as the main or only item being purchased. Can someone explain it to me like a 3 year old, please :
I have a terrible migrane today and stuff is not making sense like I know it should and I definately want to be on the list.
TIA

The cookbooks are on sale for $10. So, the organization will make the normal fundraiser % on that sale. But, if folks would want to add on an additional $5 say...it would go directly to the organization. (That's not exact totals, you need to add tax and shipping per order, but you get the general idea!)

 

[Leigh0725]

Donnation Break downOkay - so created a spreadsheet in Excel to help with the break down of the costs/donnations. It really SUCKS that our tax rate is so high (7.525%). In order for the organization to get any donnation on just one cookbook being bought, the price needs to be $16. In actuality, it's still a great deal b/c buying a regular cookbook here would be over $20. ($14.74 + 4) * 1.07525 = $20.15

So I can't upload a .xls file here. :-( I copied what I created in Excel and pasted it into Word. Of course your figures will be differe based on tax %, but it gives you a general idea.

 

[melissalough]

so, should I call back?

 

[LibrarianChef]

so, should I call back?

I would simply because they didn't get to give you the whole run-down of information and they asked me not to list it out here because they wanted to talk to each person individually.

I don't know exactly what they're doing with these, but my director told me they're keeping track of names and numbers and conversations (I think they're recorded, right?). This way you can also ask all of your questions about this. You'll probably think of another question or two that goes along with the fundraiser.

 

[abrahamlaur]

is there any way for someone to share a flier they are going to make up to send to these people? after we have talked with HO ... i'm going to do it, according to what they say when I call, but I'm so uncreative when it comes to making letters and stuff

 

[krzymomof4]

Has anyone gotten response from HO yet?
Why can't you just do a fundraiser and put cookbooks (guest special price) and add a few items on there for $10 each. Then cut the price this way (different states would be different. I am going by IN which is 6%).
Order 1 item $15, 2 items $26, 3 items $37. I rounded the figures up. You could either donate the change to the organization or round up for the second harvest.

So my figures in my previous post would be correct if based on 6% sales tax right? or wrong?

 

[heat123]

My mind is twirling from all of this. I don't understand the "donated" amount and why this is going to be different from a regular fundraiser with the guest special cookbooks as the main or only item being purchased. Can someone explain it to me like a 3 year old, please :
I have a terrible migrane today and stuff is not making sense like I know it should and I definately want to be on the list.
TIA

Me too, I'm confused.

So We charge them $15 and that covers tax and shipping and the difference goes to the donation for the school or organization and each guest will receive their own official reciepts: breaking down cost of book, tax, shipping and donation given? Is that the gist of it?

 

[krzymomof4]

So, I called HO and was told I can do a fundraiser with only or primarily the guest special cookbooks, however, I was not allowed to charge a set price, i.e. $15 to make it easy on the students and mark the rest as a donation to that particular organization, unless it went to RUFTH.
I kind of wish they would get their facts straight. Now I don't know what to do.

 

[abrahamlaur]

krzymomof4 ... i am very confused as well .. i dont think all the representatives know what exactly they are talking about .. i talked with two different people just now and they each gave me a different answer.

Librarian - could you email me, i have a few questions for you to see if I cna sort thru this in my head ... its ... [email protected] ... thank you!