The first decision you’ll need to make when you hold a coupon book sale for your organization is whether you’ll partner with a coupon book company or make your own books. Both methods have advantages and challenges that you’ll need to weigh to decide what’s best for your organization.

If you sell your coupon books through a company, you’ll have less work to do on your end. The company will handle the financial aspects of the fundraiser and send you pre-made books, so you can focus on selling and distributing the coupons. You’ll need to negotiate a contract with the company and evaluate their product carefully to make sure they have coupons that work at businesses in your area, though.

Making your own coupon books eliminates the problem of coupons that don’t work in your area as you can customize the book to include locally owned stores and restaurants as well as chains that have locations in your community. But the process is more time-consuming, both in creating the book (which requires access to a print shop and graphic design tools) and in contacting businesses to see what discounts they’re willing to offer.

Steps to Make Your Own Coupon Book

1. Get in touch with local businesses or service providers to determine who is willing to offer what coupons.
2. Design the book’s layout digitally, either by hiring a graphic designer or by arranging the coupons in a page layout program such as Microsoft Word or Adobe InDesign.
3. Send the finalized book to a printer.
4. Set a price for your book by calculating the total cost of making each book and the profit you want to go back to your organization.
5. Once your books are printed and delivered, start selling!

Steps to Sell Coupon Books Through a Company

1. Choose your coupon book program based on pricing and on the company’s offerings.
2. Verify your contract and the company’s rules for selling.
3. Sell your coupon books to supporters either by directing them to the company’s website or by presenting your inventory to them in person.
4. When the company receives a report of your sales, a portion of the profits will go back to your organization.