So, your booster club fundraising has paid off, and your club has a good amount of revenue to spend. Before you break the bank, you might want to know what your club can and cannot spend your hard-earned funds on.
Typical booster club revenue uses come in the form of activity-related uses for the teams and organizations a booster club supports and operating and management-related expenses for booster club management. Before your club spends a dime, it is vital to know how the typical booster club revenue uses.
Activity Related Uses
First and foremost, the primary use of booster club revenue should go toward the activities that the booster club supports. This means helping the sports teams, bands, clubs, and other school orgs that are serviced by the booster club. This should come first out of all the typical booster club revenue uses.
Revenue can be spent for these groups to help or completely meet their need and assist them. This can come in the form of things such as purchasing new uniforms for the baseball team, paying for the travel expenses for a marching band competition out of state, or buying new helmets for the football team.
The entire role of a booster club is to support the efforts of sports teams and organizations, so your primary revenue use should do just that.
Club Management Uses
As an organization, booster clubs need the best tools and resources to help them serve their teams and orgs. These resources and tools oftentimes are not always free or cheap. Typical booster club revenue uses include paying for the tools and expenses needed by volunteers and booster club management to run the booster club. These expenses found in marketing, management, operating, and events, are necessary and should be considered as your club considers spending revenue.
Marketing Uses
Promoting booster club fundraising efforts can cost a great deal. Some of the revenue a booster club makes should be set aside for the marketing budget. This money can be used to recoup losses or expenses from advertising an event previously or set aside to save for an upcoming event.
Management Uses
Management tools are anything that booster club management uses to run a booster club. This can be physical items such as pens, paper, printers, computers, etc. Or it can be less tangible tools such as software for accounting and other electronic tools.
These tools are primarily used for regular organizational operations. Booster clubs should be generous in providing funds for management uses but make sure to keep the spending to only what is necessary and not overindulge in purchases for the club.
Operating Uses
Operating uses are similar to management uses. As management uses its tools, operating expenses are any costs associated with the club. So instead of just computer software or printers, some operating expenses of a booster club may be advertising fees, website hosting costs, bank fees, and in some cases and special circumstances, insurance.
In the booster club revenue uses category, operating uses are among the most consistent. However, all clubs are different and will have different operating expenses. The biggest determining factor in operating expenses is a booster club’s size and the number of teams, clubs, and orgs they serve.
Some booster clubs take the initiative and save up to one year of operating expenses in advance in the event of an emergency. This is a good idea and method to consider for your club.
Event Uses
Another way booster club revenue can be used is for booster club events. This is done by using the revenue to pay for the costs of a potential event. For example, if a booster club wants to host a golf tournament fundraiser, they will need to pay to reserve a course. The club can use the money saved from a previous fundraiser and use it to help pay these costs.
What Revenue Can NOT be Used For
Booster club revenue is strictly for the advancement of clubs, organizations, and teams that a booster club supports and for the operating expenses of a club ONLY. Booster club revenue is not meant to be spent on personal uses or salaries or be dispersed to individuals directly or indirectly in any way.
Although revenue can be used to pay for tools and resources for volunteers, it may not be used to directly pay volunteers or booster club management in any way. All booster club members, from booster club management down, should be volunteers who are not paid in any way.
Spending Guidelines
In addition to general rules of booster clubs, such as not paying volunteers, clubs will need to act according to local, state, and federal laws and guidelines. This is important as each state is different from the next and imposes varied laws.
Make sure that as you are spending booster club revenue, you are doing so in an ethical, legal, and altruistic way for your club and your local area.
The spending of booster club revenue should be by committee and not individuals. This will ensure that everyone is aware of how funds are used and that there are no unforeseen or unaccounted expenses. Additionally, all expenses should be tracked and recorded in some fashion. This can be either by pen and paper or with software online. Either way, anytime revenue is dispersed from the club in any form, it should be recorded for review, evaluation, and transparency for booster club management.
Proper Revenue Use Brings Success
Once again, after you raise money for your booster club, it’s only half the battle. The other fight is making sure that you spend your revenue in an honest and efficient way. By proper monitoring of booster club revenue uses, your booster club will not only stay out of trouble and be honest, but you will be successful by managing and investing funds in the best way possible.
