Your festival, written by Friday.
Flyer, sponsor letter, volunteer ask, run sheet, thank-you post. From your notes. $29.
Before · the chair's notes
“I have the Fall Festival in 3 weeks and nothing written down except my notes, which are this email. … I want an actual letter I can hand out to businesses on Main Street. Tiers, I was thinking: $500 Gold, $250 Silver, $100 Bronze … People always sign up for the fun shifts and nobody does cleanup so I want to make cleanup sound good somehow.”
After · the event pack
The sponsor letter, Gold tier
Gold, $500. Your banner on the field fence for the whole festival, your name on the festival flyer that goes home with every student, and a thank-you on the PTO Facebook page.
The volunteer ask
Cleanup crew, 6 to 7:30 PM. The shift with the best view: the field empty, the money counted, the leftover hot dogs.
Questions for you
Does the PTO have its 501(c)(3) letter in hand? Until Priya confirms, the sponsor letter makes no tax claim.
Sample event pack · an invented school, from the 540-word email below
Three steps.
Send the brain-dump
The event in your own words, however rough: what is on, what it costs, who is doing the food, what the money is for, the sponsor tiers you have in mind, the shifts you need filled, the rough timing of the day, and the words your principal does not want. The email you were going to send a friend is exactly right.
We write the five pieces
A flyer that leads with the games and puts the goal under it. A sponsor letter a business owner can say yes to in one read, with your tiers and your deadline. A volunteer ask that makes the cleanup shift sound like the one to take. A run sheet timed line by line. A thank-you post with the brackets ready. Nothing added that you did not give.
Read the questions
A Word file, a text file and a PDF proof within two days, with a list of what we tidied or moved and why, and your open questions: the sponsor deadline, the ticket price, the tax line. One free round of changes within a week, so a late sponsor still goes in.
What you send, what you get.
Subject: fall festival words - HELP - Maple Hollow PTO Hi, I'm the new events chair (Dana) for the Maple Hollow Elementary PTO and I have the Fall Festival in 3 weeks and nothing written down except my notes, which are this email. Sorry it's a mess. The event: Maple Hollow Fall Festival, Saturday November 8, 3 to 6 pm, on the back field, gym if it rains (principal said yes to the gym). Free to get in, we sell game tickets, I think 50 cents each or 12 for $5, we did that last year. Food: Rotary club is doing hot dogs again (they donate it all, bless them), the 5th grade is doing a bake sale table for their DC trip, there's a cider stand. Games: cake walk, ring toss, pumpkin bowling, face painting (Mrs. Ortiz's daughter's art club), the hay maze from the Hendersons' farm, a photo spot with hay bales, costume parade at 4:30 for the little kids. Last year we cleared about $3,800 and this year the goal is $4,500 because we are trying to replace the kindergarten playground mulch and get new library beanbags. Sponsors. Last year the previous chair just emailed a few parents who own businesses. I want an actual letter I can hand out / email to businesses on Main Street. Tiers, I was thinking: $500 "Gold" - banner on the field fence for the day and name on the flyer and the PTO facebook, $250 "Silver" - name on a sign at a game booth and facebook, $100 "Bronze" - name on the thank you board at the entrance. Also happy to take donated stuff (cake walk cakes, prizes) instead of …
Maple Hollow Fall Festival · the event pack
The flyer
“Cake walk, ring toss, pumpkin bowling, face painting by the art club, the Hendersons' hay maze, a hay-bale photo spot, and the little kids' costume parade at 4:30. Rotary hot dogs, the fifth grade's bake sale, and hot cider.” games first, goal second
The day-of run sheet
“4:30 PM. Costume parade on the field for the little kids; booths pause for ten minutes so the shift change happens here. Second-shift volunteers check in at the ticket table from 4:15.”
What we tidied · questions for you
Eight lines saying what was moved or written from your facts (“festival” never “carnival”, no raffle words, the tax line left out until the treasurer confirms, the shift change moved to the parade, cleanup given the best line) and six questions your notes left open, each a one-line change. No price, tier, name or total is in the pack that you did not give. nothing invented
An invented school and a 540-word email. Yours is written from your own notes: one event, five pieces.
Fall festival planning kits on Etsy sell for $19.99 to $29 and a trunk-or-treat packet bundle for $19.98 to $24.98: templates with blanks, the words left to you. This is the words: your event, your tiers, your shifts and your principal's rules, written out so you can print, post and hand them to a business on Main Street, with every right kept by your group.
- The flyer text: games first, goal second, what to bring
- The sponsor letter with your tiers, deadline and where checks go
- The volunteer ask and the shift list, cleanup included
- The day-of run sheet, timed, with the rain plan
- The thank-you post, brackets ready for the total
- A Word file, a text file and a PDF proof · one free round of changes
Send the notes.
Three questions.
What exactly do I get?
Five pieces for one event, within two days after payment, as a Word file you can edit, a text file and a PDF proof (Letter size): the flyer text (headline, the what's-on paragraph, when and where, what it costs, what the money is for, what to bring); the sponsor letter, with the tiers and prices you set, the deadline and where checks go; the volunteer ask (the sign-up post and the shift list, with the unpopular shift written to be chosen); the day-of run sheet, timed line by line, with the rain plan and the sponsors to thank; and the thank-you post, with brackets where the total, the count and the names go after the day. With it: a list of what we tidied, moved or wrote from your notes and why, and a numbered list of the things your notes left open. One free round of changes within a week.
Will you invent a sponsor tier, a price, or a tax line?
No. Every price, tier, time, name and total in the pack is one you gave; where your notes leave something open, the pack takes the plainest reading and lists it as a question for you. The sponsor letter carries no tax-deductibility sentence unless you confirm your group's nonprofit status, and the pack never uses raffle, drawing or prize-draw wording, because in most US states those are regulated; a cake walk is written as a game with tickets, which is what it is. Nothing here is legal, tax or fundraising advice: it is the wording of your own plan.
Is this a template, a design or a sign-up tool?
Words only, written from your notes, not a template with blanks. No flyer design, no printing, no banner, no sign-up tool and no money handling: the flyer text drops into whatever you lay it out in, the shift list pastes into the sign-up page you already use, and the letter prints on your group's letterhead. One event at this price; a second event, a spring carnival in the spring or a year-round sponsor packet is a new order, and we say so before you pay.
Get the sample event pack first
The invented Maple Hollow pack: the chair's email and the five finished pieces as a PDF, and our one-page run-sheet skeleton for a three-hour school festival.