Day 16 - Book Fair

Let me start off by being honest.  The Book Fair is not what today’s topic is supposed to be about. I am supposed to be giving you another tech tip. Looking back at my blogging challenge I have already given you 3 so I’m a little burnt out. I do however have book fair on the brain.

Our book fair is the week of March 3-7 so here are some things I’ve learned over the years and during my +15 book fairs I’ve run

-       Order decorations from Oriental Trading. It never fails. They always have supplies to match the theme.

-       Though I run the fair from my small library for most of the week I do move the fair down to the gym and set it back up for Family Night. It is a lot of work but definitely helps with crowd control and just makes the event seem more special.

-       Try something new. I typically sell pizza from Dominos and food and drinks that teachers have donated. I have an area set up for eating in the gym. This time I am getting a food truck. My school system did have them sign a contract and they will be donating 10% of food sales back to the school.

-       I give a small freebie to students for coming to Family Night. Just an extra little incentive to come. I’ve given out an Egyptian headband to color, a mini maraca, US flag, erasers – just something inexpensive and cute.

-       Two years ago I heard about a coin contest at a workshop. I decided to give it a try and the results almost made me fall over! I did a boys vs. girls contest. Each day student’s brought in a different kind of coin. I added up all of the change that was brought and divided it by the number of classroom teachers I have. That’s how much money the teachers got to spend on books for their room. I ran it the week before the book fair so teachers could pick out what they wanted and I wouldn’t get the coin contest money confused with the shopping money. It counted as a “One for Books” transaction. The group that won got a banner designed for them and hung up in the library. In 2012 the girls one and in the Fall of 2013 the boys won. The banner will remain hanging until the next Fall fair.

-       Something else I started about 4 years ago was “Donuts with Dad”. On the last day of book fair, right before school starts the dads come with their child and get a free donut and drink (bottled water, donated juice, coffee). Once again you could have knocked me over with a feather for that first one. 1/3 of my students brought their dads…easily.

-       If you plan an event where you need food or drink make them RSVP. I don’t know what divine intervention came down upon me the first time I did Donuts with Dad but thank goodness I asked them to RSVP. I NEVER expected to get the turnout we did and would have ran out of food VERY FAST had it not been for the RSVP. You would have seen me in the corner crying because I would have been so sad to not have enough food. We have at least 250 people for this event between the dad and the student.

I am very excited about the Book Fair Fiesta. What a fun theme for the Spring!