by Anna C. & Cathy D.
Monthly donations for almost all churches cover only basic operational expenses. So, what do churches do to build or expand buildings, serve the needs of changing populations, make charitable contributions, constantly improve ministries and educational offerings, and nurture the next generation? Apparently, a great deal, as we found out.
Our team of volunteers, mostly inexperienced fundraisers, was astounded by the vigor, variety, and scope of church fundraising programs across the country — from festivals and bake sales to raffles, galas, and competitions. And by far the prevalent theme in all these activities was, — guess what? — food, of course; homemade, delicious food made by parishioners that reflect the parish’s ethnic roots, talents of individual parishioners, and market demand. You may be as surprised as we were to find out that some churches were able to generate hundreds of thousands of dollars annually through these efforts.
You will not be surprised to hear that when our team brainstormed fundraising ideas, our priority project involved — what else? — food, of course!
We launched forward and created a St. Mary brand and website for our fundraising efforts — St. Mary Kitchen at stmarykitchen.com. The team pored over best practices, ideas, and suggestions and decided to adopt a bimonthly or quarterly “pasta take out." Pasta, we thought, is found in many international cuisines and is a staple in many diets. It could be the basis for millions of recipes and could be dressed up or down as a sophisticated gourmet dish or a hearty family dinner. It sounded like a good idea to throw on the wall to see if it stuck.
Unlike many other parish, St. Mary's does not have an abundance of restaurateurs among its parishioners. Our small team of cooks — Sdn. Nick (principal chef), Cathy, Claudia, Maria, and Anna — braved the learning curve of how to cook in large quantities, create and coordinate a cooking team, shop from specialty restaurant suppliers, selecting the right kind of containers to use, and all sorts of other production minutia. The task was daunting, so we decided that the best way to learn if the system worked and gauge market response was to have a dry run among just our parishioners. And on Sunday, September 17, our first "customers" (you!) picked up their orders.
The results were encouraging. We took 23 orders of 84 servings. Sales revenue came to $1228.59, and after the deduction of expenses plus donations, our profit was $980.65. To us, this was a successful first effort!
A first attempt will always have some growing pains, and we have learned a lot from our dry run. Chief among our lessons was that, while the meal was generally well-received, we limited our customer base by offering only a meat option. In future runs, we'd like to offer a non-meat option and offer a more complete meal.
We are grateful to our hard-working team, to those who generously supported our effort by ordering or donating, to those who filled out the feedback questionnaire, and those who have offered more ideas and expressed interest in helping. Your feedback has been invaluable to us for informing our decisions moving forward.
We are currently exploring 3 future to-go options:
- November: Thanksgiving bake sale
- December: Christmas dessert sale
- January/February: Pasta Takeout
If these and other fundraisers are to succeed and help with St. Mary’s capital expenses as it builds its future, we must all come together as a community to support these efforts. Please talk to Anna C. or Cathy D. about your interest in volunteering, providing feedback and ideas, promoting events, or just asking questions.
