Alter Marching Knights Mulch Sale

The Alter Marching Knights in Kettering Ohio have two main fundraisers every year to offset the cost of operating the high quality program delivered by the band. The main fundraiser is a mulch sale with the key objective of raising the necessary money to provide opportunities for our band to travel, compete, experience seeing other great music programs and grow as musicians. Our mulch sale sells and delivers on average 11,800 bags of mulch and requires the support of all band members, staff, parents and community. It has been raising funds for the over 30 years growing over the more recent years both in scope and fundraising dollars. Starting as a small 2 day sale, it has become a 6 day, multi-shift effort raising on average $20,000 over the last 5 years. Planning starts six months prior to the sale with the establishment of the committees: Marketing/Communications, Transportation, Yard, Volunteers, Hospitality and Operations/Database Management. Every band member and parent are required to support this sale and the football team and other volunteers help to ensure success.

Parents have a critical role in both the planning and delivery of the mulch. Beyond the committees listed above, parents drive all the flat bed trucks (2-3 per shift) and 2-3 chaser cars per truck to transport the kids. There are volunteers working in the yard to load the flat bed trucks and to clear any trash. It has been learned that providing breakfast and lunch each day of the mulch sale helps to keep timelines so having the parents run the hospitality station ensure that all volunteers are hydrated and fed.

2019 was the best mulch sale to date with over $22,000 raised and all mulch was sold by the end of the sale, the first time in its history. In addition to the Mulch Sale supporting the band, the Alter Lacrosse team’s fundraiser is to spread the mulch delivered.

Highlights of the 2019 sale:

• 11,886 bags of mulch sold and delivered.
• Total # of shifts completed by band kids 184
• Total # of shifts completed by parents 169

• Local community members within 15 miles of the high school
• Band alumni and Alumni of the school
• 80% of the buyers are returning buyers each year
• The Kettering community is approximately 55,000
• Alter High School is a Co-ed Catholic High School in Kettering with just over 600 students in grades 9-12

Committee meetings and conversations with school officials are the two most important factors to kick off the year of planning. Because school parking lot space is required for an extended amount of time and because most of the student volunteers are Alter students, the mulch sale dates are an important first step. After those dates are vetted, the planning begins. The timeline below is organized by number of months before the sale.

The timeline for the Mulch sale is as follows:

• 12 Months to Sale – Chair Identified (Usually a 2 year commitment) and dates picked/coordinated with other school activities
• 6 Months to Sale – Committees Chairs named, Parents are trained by prior chairs
• 5 Months to Sale – Mulch quotes received, communication plan, website work identified, hospitality budget identified, transportation plan identified
• 4 Months to Sale – Mulch chosen and ordered, trucks reserved, volunteers sign ups created, signs ordered if needed – often signs are reused
• 3 Months to Sale – Website goes live, coincides with Alter High School Fish Fry, phone # goes live
• 2 Months to Sale – Call night, students call former customers to notify of sale
• 1 Months to Sale – Social media, church bulletins, communication plan executed
• 1 week out – Routes are planned based on orders

Mulch Sale & Delivery

• 1 month post sale — lessons learned review – an opportunity to review items that can be improved on at the next sale.

The Alter Music Association establishes a budget of $30,000 primarily to purchase the mulch and transportation. The 2019 expenditures are shown in the attached file.

There have been three major challenges that the mulch sale has overcome since its inception: Technology, Volunteers and the coordination with the school.

In the beginning of the mulch sale all planning and coordination was done manually using physical maps and hand written plans. As the sale grew it became clear that the effort was far greater than could be accomplished by a single parent. A group of parents with computer skills created a new tool using both Access and Map. The Access database has all the data over the last 10 years of customers, contact information, addresses, order history, etc so that we can track trends in purchasing. This database is also used to create the call night sheets that are given to the band students on call night. Each student is required to call a set of former customers to remind them of the sale. Because of the database, call night has been a huge success in getting former customers to order again. In addition to the database, we use a mapping routine developed by the same parents that enable us to easily route the flatbed trucks. Because each shift is 3 hours it important to create a route that maximizes deliveries while maintaining load size and route time. Having this mapping application enables the team to quickly route multiple trucks over multiple shifts effectively. Volunteers are always tricky especially when more and more commitment is required. The Alter Music Association has created a mandatory requirement for all band kids and parents in order to make a successful sale. Making this a mandatory event has reduced the issues in getting volunteers. We have also been very fortunate to have the support of the head football coach who provides incentives for the football players to help out as well. We added a volunteer coordinator that makes sure all parts of the volunteers is managed. Although the work is hard, many of the students and parents enjoy working the sale and several come back to support even after their kids graduate.

Finally our last challenge is simply working around all the major activities and other fundraisers happening in the school. The school publishes the next year calendar prior to the end of the school year. The mulch committee works with the school to schedule the sale and to reserve the rooms needed. Many times there is a conflict of some sort (Prom, Senior Trip etc.) but the volunteer coordinator will advertise this when the sign up links are posted giving kids and parents ample opportunity to work around schedules. The mulch sale dates are announced a year in advance to also help with planning.

As was mentioned above, we upgraded the technology of the program to simplify the way we track and route the orders placed. This has provided a rich source of data so that we can show year over year trends and growth opportunities. In addition, we worked with the school to go from a cash/check only sale to allowing for credit card purchasing. By adding credit cards to the mix not only did purchases increase but tracking down payments at the end of the sale greatly reduced. This benefited the cash flow for the organization significantly. Another huge impact to our sale was the introduction of social medial. Parents are provided a script that they can post on all of their media that spreads the word around the community very quickly. We have seen an increase in orders since utilizing these platforms.

The mulch sale keeps band fees reasonably priced but also allows our students to be able to experience the best bands in the country by attending and competing nationally. The last few large funded trips include attending Super Regionals and Regional Bands of America competitions in San Antonio, TX, St. Louis, MO. and Newark, DE. We are also able to travel to local competitions and make it a point to participate in Grand Nationals every year. The sale also helps our little band gain notoriety in the community which also helps our school attract and retain students who may not have known about our program otherwise. As we make the mulch sales calls and when we deliver the mulch our students are able to meet community members and talk to them about our school and program.

• Set a small or manageable goal for sales when you start.
• Make sure there are no other mulch sales in your area.
• This project requires a substantial volunteer base who will be able dedicate time and sweat to the project.
• Gain the support of the school administrators and make sure you can select dates that are not at odds with your needs for storage of the mulch.
• Talk to other teams in advance to see if they would be willing to volunteer to assist in delivery.
• If you plan to deliver the mulch be sure you have room for trucks to load and unload. We use forklifts and large flatbeds.
• Treat your volunteers to water and additional hospitality if you are able! Lifting 20 pound mulch bags is hard work.