Prom Dress Drive

Similar to: Clothing Swaps

Prom season is upon us! You may not be able to get your friends to donate money to your fundraising efforts, but you might be able to get them to donate last year’s prom or homecoming dress. Send out text messages asking all of your friends if they would be willing to donate their used formalwear to help with your fundraising efforts. Most girls only wear formal dresses once (like to junior prom), and then don’t ever wear them again. Have your friends bring their formalwear to school and then collect it over the period of a week or two. Just like with a clothing swap, book a location for your prom dress drive — like a church hall, a school cafeteria, or a community center. (You’ll probably be able to get space for free if you tell the venue manager that you’re running a prom dress drive to make formalwear less expensive for students who might be struggling to afford the prom experience. All of the profits are going to help fund your course fee for the summer. It’s like two charitable causes in one!)

We recommend accepting formalwear (dresses, suits, etc.), jewelry, handbags, and dress shoes. Make sure that you have supervised changing areas available for anyone who wants to try on clothes. You want to sell the dresses for at least $25 each. Just like with clothing swaps, you can also get vendors into the space (ex. limo drivers, hair and make-up stylists, florists, tuxedo rental stores, etc.) and charge them $35 per table to advertise their goods and services. You can also have a refreshments table for anyone who’s getting peckish while shopping, all decked out with donated food and drinks (that you, of course, sell for $0.50-2 per item).

You could also host this event as a resale. That means that girls can bring in their dresses and display them as being for sale. They’re allowed to set their own prices for their dresses; we recommend setting the price at 35-50% of the original retail price (so a $150 dress would be marked as $50-75). You split the profits on the dress 50/50. Alternatively, you could set up your resale so that girls keep 100% of their profits on the dress, but you charge a set rate (like $10 per dress) for them to bring it in and display it. You can also charge a $5 admission fee for anyone who comes in to buy, which could further increase your profits.