Thanks so much for your responses! I really appreciate all of your great ideas. Now this doesn't seem so daunting. We have a great group of volunteers that came to our planning meeting and even though not one of us has ever done this before, I am now more confident that we can pull this off. I would love your Excel spreadsheet PTA Renegade, just let me know how to get it from you.
Thanks Again!!!
Liza

I'm in my 4th year of running the school carnival, and here's my take on food, prizes, etc:

We have had much success with the following formula for food: plan on half the school attendance showing up, each with 2 parents or siblings (approx 750-800). Plan on feeding each of them 1.0 servings entree items (750-800 pizza/hot dogs, etc), and .25 servings of each side item (popcorn, nachos, cotton candy). Now plan on 2 sodas/drinks for each attendee. You do want to pretty much run low on food by the last hour or half hour, but put a backup plan in place (just in case all 500 students decide to show up and bring their extended family); have someone ready to pop out and pick up more hot dogs and soda.

As far as prizes go, I'm prone to buying prizes by the case at rock-bottom prices and keeping the extras over to the next year. Rhode Island Novelty has pretty awesome prices (not advertising here-I'm a customer, not an employee), but the cases can sometimes have 400-2000 of a single item, so make sure you have a storage place for the leftovers.

One thing we did last year with outstanding results was offer a presale $3.00 wristband for the inflatables that, when worn, entitled the wearer to unlimited inflatable rides. This kept the ticket line short and ensured that the kids had something to do when the parents' $$ ran low. Also, the presale of the wristbands ensured that the expense of hiring the inflatables was covered in advance.

I think I still have an Carnival Excel program that I wrote that uses formulas to compute attendance and how it affects how much to buy in food, prizes, candy and the like; If anyone reads this REALLY long post and wants a copy, I'll email it to you - LMK, but no email addresses in your post, please! Thanks!!

We are getting geared up for our carnival as well. Like yourself, this will be the first time in several years for doing our carnival. We ordered games from SchoolCarnivals.com too. Since our PTO has recently reorganized (the previous one just flopped about 3 years ago), we started ours back up this year and are in full swing. Of course, we only collected $2 membership dues so our startup money was weak. Our school only has about 600 kids total (K-12). But, we have received tremendous support from our Superintendant & Principals, too.

To get our carnival started (as those games are not cheap), we solicited local businesses and asked for them to sponsor a classroom for $50. We have raised over $1,000 so far and are using that money to purchase our games & prizes. The corporate sponsors in return will be getting recognition on all the notes that are sent home prior to the carnival, and on each classroom door there will be a large poster with their logo & business name printed showing they are the sponsor (simply scan their business card and print out on 11x17 paper).

One thing to keep in mind if you solicit local businesses to sponsor your carnival for the initial startup, be sure you send them a thank you note. We're going to have a huge sheet of paper taped to the door with a pencil hanging from a string for people to sign the sheet. We're also going to get a few 8th graders armed with digital cameras to go around that night and snap pictures of the rooms with people playing the game & the logo signage on the door; those pics will be enclosed in a thank you note with that sheet of paper signed by everyone.

Another idea for the carnival, we're having each classroom host a game. I presented our idea at the faculty meeting and asked for each teacher to pick the game her/his classroom wanted to host. Then, on the day of carnival night (which is a Friday night), about 1 hour before the end of the school day, the teacher will have the kids put away their work and start helping setup for the night's carnival game. When they're done preparing their room & decorating it, they will have the remaining time to play their game. This will also allow the kids to take some ownership on the carnival -- it becomes everyone's carnival and not just PTO's carnival. It also enforces a good turnout because of the excitement in the air!!! About 2 weeks before the carnival, send notes home to the parents in each classroom asking for them to sign up to work a shift in the room.

We're going to have at least 2 games in each room to keep the lines moving -- and so each classroom will need 2 parent workers per shift. The parent workers will work a 15 or 20 minute shift and that consists of collecting the tickets to play and assisting players with the games.

We are having a redeemtion booth for prizes and giving out the "star" tickets (from oriental trading) to the winners.

One last idea, to build hype about the carnival (since this will be our first), we're going to have contests the weeks before the carnival for kids to have chances to win free tickets to play the games. One contest idea is we're putting jelly beans in a jar in the office and letting the kids guess how many -- the closest child in each grade without going over the number will win 5 tickets (or whatever!). For the smaller kids in kindergarten, if they don't get their name on the board all week, they all will receive 2 tickets on Friday.

These are just ideas we've been thinking of and thought I'd share some of the thoughts. Good luck with your event!

I'm on the 4th year of planning carnivals. We have had a school anywhere from 550-600. I can give you my figure avg over the last 3 years so you can have some kinda of numbers idea, maybe guesstimate a little lower. Also, send out a flyer asking parents if they are planning on attending and how many so you can also get a rough figure of your needs.

Food: Check to see if your school has a contract with Pepsi or Coke (or someone else) You can get your drinks free. Also if you are playing the pop ring toss game and you run out of cans you can grab 2 liters to use. What type of food are you wanting to serve and maybe I could help more specifically.

Prizes... ok this is the fun part. There is a mathmatical way to do this. Depending on if you are giving prizes out at each game OR doing a redemption center. Check out www.schoolcarnivals.com/Prizes/prizes_&_supplies.htm

That whole website is a gold mine of help!

I thought of one other thing. There is a fabulous web site called schoolcarnivals.com which has a very thorough list of carnival games, and some they even have the games for sale at a very reasonable price. I have placed an order for several games but have not recieved them yet. I am planning that they are the quality to make it through one carnival then get tossed.

I usually am not involved much with the food when we have our carnival, so I cannot help you there. However, I am usually in charge of the games and so I can offer some advice there.

We have 550 kids in out school, so about the same size school. We are spoiled in that we are a elementary school on half the building and a middle school on the other half, so we have two cafeterias that open into one and three gyms that open into one. So we have no space problems.

The three inflatables seems right, the only thing you might look at is if the ten carnival games will be enough. We have about 25 to 30 small carnival games. Now at times some games might have no people at them, but nothing will send people home quicker than having to wait in a line to win a worthless trinket. I am afraid you will have people waiting in lines the whole night. They will wait in line for a dunk tank or a giant slide, but will have a harder time waiting in line for a lollipop tree.

Also, we have found that the small carnival games make the money, the giant slide and dunk tank will either lose money or at best break even. We sell 50 cent tickets, so to pay for a $700 giant slide you must have 1400 sliders. That is seven riders every minute just to break even. Yet you can rent a $40 carnival game and can make $300 on it and have made at least $200 when you subtract the prizes. Not because you are out to make money, but you at least need to pay for the big inflatables.

A good rule of thumb is a game for every classroom you have. I try to visit every school in the area which is having a carnival, and they seem to have the inflatables in the gym and then a game in each classroom.

Also, we keep track of the tickets each year for each game, so we have a clue how many prizes to have next year. I can send you our past carnival results just to give you a clue how many games we have and what each game does for the night.

Last note, we do not do a moon walk because the volunteers who have to man it absolutely hate it, and they let me know.