We built FutureFund to deliver the best free fundraising experience for K-12 schools. See why here, and find out what software we recommend for other types of nonprofit groups as well.
Updated July 24, 2024
Here’s a list of 12 ways you can infuse the spirit of Halloween into your school fundraisers and draw in more participants! From hosting a costume contest to a trunk-or-treat, these ideas are perfect for PTAs and PTOs hoping to achieve big goals this year.
Join the most popular school fundraising newsletter online.
Every week we bring hands-on fundraising advice meant to help K-12 school groups smash their fundraising goals. Join our 10,000+ member community!
Run Your School Halloween Fundraiser with FutureFund
Our platform comes with powerful tools that can help you fundraise for your school throughout the Halloween season. These include:
- Ready-to-go campaign templates so you can sell tickets or items for different events.
- A built-in messaging system you can use to announce your fundraisers and provide details.
- Opportunity to create volunteer sign-up lists to optimize parent and community involvement.
- Powerful financial reporting tools to help you track your earnings, stay compliant, and plan future fundraisers more effectively.
Get started with FutureFund today or book a demo to see how it can work for you.
Donation Campaigns
These campaigns encourage parents and friends to donate directly to your school group. FutureFund makes it easy to collect money online during the campaign, but you can also pair your donation campaign with a spooky in-person event to make your fundraiser more meaningful.
Learn how to run a donation campaign with FutureFund here.
Tip: Use FutureFund’s messaging system to announce the fundraiser and include a link to the online campaign so that people can still donate even if they can’t attend the event.
Ghost Tours
Are there any places in town rumored to have ghostly activity? Accept donations to take people on a guided ghost tour of them!
Get the kids involved with this one as well. Have them do some research on your community’s history, map out a walk throughout the highlights of town, and then have those same kids deliver the tour to patrons. Just make sure to direct guests to your school’s FutureFund campaign page to accept funds.
Pumpkin Carving
Set up a few stations for pumpkin carving at your next big event! For a donation, the artists get a pumpkin and access to a full set of tools and anything else they’ll need to create their masterpiece!
Also, for extra engagement, send the pumpkin seeds home with the sculptors to turn them into a tasty and healthy snack after the event.
Haunted Golf Course
Accept donations for competitors to play best ball on a golf course decked out for Halloween! This fundraiser combines spooky season and sport into an activity they entire family can enjoy together. Collect donations at the event and display a QR linking to the donation campaign so participants can donate online.
Trunk-or-Treat
Organize a trunk-or-treat event! All you need is some candy to pass out, the trunk of your car, and volunteers. Ask families, community members, and business partners/sponsors to come join in on the fun.
Get everyone together with their costumes, candy, and cars, and have the trick-or-treaters go from car to car to trick-or-treat. Feel free to decorate your trunk if you like and wear your spooky best! The Booster Club can request donations at the event or connect trunk-or-treaters to the online donation campaign.
Undead Dog Walk
Partner with your local shelter and show off the dogs to be adopted by dressing them up in costume (if they’ll allow it) and holding a pet parade through the center of town! This is mutually beneficial to the shelter and the school while building a sense of community at the same time.
Dog walkers can carry trick-or-treat buckets to collect donations, along with displaying the QR code that links directly to the FutureFund donation site for your school. Also, don’t forget to talk to local businesses about donating to support the shelter and the school.
Purchase Campaigns
Any kind of fundraiser where you sell physical items or event tickets is a purchase campaign. Add tickets for your Halloween events or sell pumpkins in your school’s online store in FutureFund by creating specific purchase campaigns for them.
Learn how to run a purchase campaign here.
Tip: Always run purchase campaigns alongside physical item sales events, since this allows you to make sales 24/7 and lets people make purchases even if they can’t attend the event.
Costume Contest
Sell entry fees for a costume contest! Students can register online through the school’s FutureFund platform before the big day arrives. The winner from each class can go on to a school-wide costume contest to compete for the overall winner.
The winner of the costume contest wins a pizza party or another group prize for their entire class! You can also charge $1 to cast votes (a dollar per voter) to heighten the fundraising aspect of the event.
Creepy Cupcake Contest
Hold a cupcake war where the theme is all things spooky and delicious! The bakers that want to participate make their best cupcake creations and your patrons pay to taste all of them and vote on the best. Charge your bakers an entrance free and then charge $1 for a vote!
See also: GUIDE: How to Run a Bake Sale
Haunted House
This is another event that you can sell tickets for in advance to generate hype and get an idea of the number of visitors you will have. Request some of your more theatrical juniors and seniors to lead the show and sign up volunteers on our platform to really make the experience run smoothly.
With a little creativity and elbow grease, your school’s gymnasium and hallways can work great as a haunted house. Or, you could even create a haunted hayride and turn the school’s parking lot into a frightful sight!
Costume Swap
A costume swap is a win-win-win event: people get to pass along costumes they no longer have a use for, find their next Halloween costume for a bargain, and funds are raised for your school group.
Collect costume donations from the community in advance – the more, the better! Host a costume swap event with a small entrance fee and don’t forget to run a purchase campaign to sell costumes online to the ghosts and goblins who can’t attend the event.
Murder Mystery Dinner Party
Host a murder mystery event/dinner! Event organizers may need to limit space to this event to make it as effective as possible but that just means you’ll be able to charge a little bit more for an exclusive event!
Once you have your list of participants together, hand out cards giving each person their role and what they’re expected to wear to the event and throw the event in a traditional murder mystery style!
See also: How to Run a Fundraising Dinner
A-Thons (Pledge Campaigns)
An “A-Thon” fundraiser is a special kind of pledge campaign you can run in FutureFund. Once you create the campaign for the event, students who sign up to participate each get a link they can use to collect donations from family and friends.
Find step-by-step instructions for successful pledge campaigns here.
Tip: The link you’ll share when you create the campaign is what you’ll use to sign up student participants. When they register for the event, they’ll each get their own unique link that they can use to raise money from members of the school community.
Costume Dance-A-thon
Have the students dress up in their costumes to attend a school dance. All you need is a few volunteers to keep up the event and have participants pay an entry fee and get a chance to dance as long as they can keep moving!
Don’t forget to have the gym ready with refreshments, a DJ with some Halloween-themed songs, and plenty of spooky decorations to set the perfect Halloween mood.
Want more inspiration? Explore our whole list of A-Thon fundraisers.
Halloween Movie Marathon
Host a movie marathon featuring fun and spooky movies! The age group you are fundraising for can dictate whether the movies are full of terror or family-friendly. Keep it going all night and see who lasts the longest before throwing in the towel!
Have watchers register beforehand through your FutureFund and start collecting pledges. Sell concessions and spirit wear during the event for another fundraising stream.
Start Your Fundraiser With FutureFund
FutureFund is FREE for schools, PTAs, and school groups. Start your fundraiser today!
Get StartedFrequently Asked Questions
How can I use FutureFund’s messaging system to promote my Halloween fundraiser?
FutureFund’s messaging system lets you:
- Send messages to every parent in your school community or filter your audience to reach specific groups.
- Create unique sender profiles to make sure the message is always coming from the appropriate party.
- Use customizable message templates to save time when broadcasting updates or announcements.
Should my school fundraiser be a Purchase or a Donation campaign?
Use Purchase campaigns to sell event tickets or physical items (like haunted house tours or costume swaps).
Use Donation campaigns to collect money from community members in support of a specific goal or cause (like pumpkin carving or trunk-or-treats).
How can I use FutureFund to track my fundraiser’s success?
FutureFund gives you the ability to generate financial reports for fundraising campaigns in just a few clicks. To do this, navigate to Store and click the Reports tab near the top of your screen. Then choose Campaign Summary from the drop-down menu and click Generate Report.
