You can read about BUILDING A BOOSTER CLUB here.

Then, read THREE ESSENTIALS TO BUILDING A BOOSTER CLUB, Part 1 here.

THREE ESSENTIALS TO BUILDING A BOOSTER CLUB Part 2

The very first thing you need to do is FIND THE RIGHT LEADERS!  Without the RIGHT leaders, you are not going to get anywhere. The second thing you must to in order to build a Booster Club is EXPRESS THE NEED!  Sometimes you get your RIGHT LEADERS through this process of Expressing The Need.  You do not always have to have the leaders in place before Expressing The Need!  Keep that in mind.

Sometimes people do not step up UNTIL they see a need that they have a passion for. I have been working with Booster Clubs for a long time now.  As I said in a previous post about Booster Clubs, I have seen great ones and poor ones.

Here are three ways to Express The Need that I have found to be effective:

1.  Informally 

The way that you informally Express The Need to your constituents is by simply telling parents, grandparents, community members, players, cousins, dogkeepers, hairdressers, administration, etc. etc. etc. that you would like to do this or that over and over again when the time comes.

Expressing The Need is simply letting people know that you would like to do something for the program, that you need money for a certain thing you want to buy.

For instance, when I took over at Capistrano Valley Christian as their Head Football Coach in 2006, I walked in to absolutely bare cupboards.  They literally had a sled that was about 15 years old, and about four footballs.  This was a BIG shock to me because I came from a program where I went through 24 footballs a year, and we had every teaching tool imaginable.

So, I just started informally Expressing The Need.  When parents would ask how things were going, or if they could help in any way, I would say “Yes, you can help.  We are going to have to raise some money for simple things like footballs, can you help me do that?”  These were in “informal” conversations on campus in the hallways, after summer practices, in an email, on the phone.

2.  Formally

The second way you can Express The Need is by sending a list of your needs and wants to the stakeholders in your program.  Put your list together and email it out to your stakeholders, pass it out at events you are at, put it on your website, etc. etc.  After you have informally put it out there that you are needing items, people will need to be reminded. So, seeing it in writing, and in a more “official” matter, may jog their memory to act. If there is no Booster Club at your school, that is the first need that you need to express!

It’s key to get a group of stakeholders involved on a regular basis to support you.  

You do not want to do all of this yourself as a coach.  You have too many other things to do, and do successfully.  You want to come alongside them, but leave the heavy lifting to your volunteer Booster Club.  Holding a meeting to Express The Need of forming a Booster Club is the way to go.  Give the parents a list of your needs, short and long term needs.  Then tell them that you want to take the program to the next level, and you need their help.

3.  Cost Analysis Research and Presentation

Several years ago we were in need of “new blood” at CVCS.  Their was a tremendous group of parents who were there for a time but their kids were all graduating.  So, I pulled together a meeting with all of our head coaches, and asked them to bring 4-5 parents each, who MIGHT be interested in helping with the Booster Club. We were a small school with just one Booster Club for all of the sports.

Here is what I did, I compared the costs of playing sports at other schools to what it cost at our school.  I was at a private school, which meant that parents had to spend money for our sports programs.  I wanted to show that we were not really asking much compared to the schools around us.  My thinking was that it would open their eyes to the costs of athletics, and to the fact that they weren’t being asked to pay much.

For instance, this is a comparative analysis for another school’s football program in our city:

ABC School CVCS
Spirit Pack 400 150
Ad Sales min. 500 N/A
Participation 1500 450
Summer Camp 300 199
Travel Bag 55 N/A
3 Day Speed Camp 40 Free
TOTAL 2795 799

If you were a parent looking at this, what would you think?  Would this motivate you to step up a little bit to help your son’s football program?

Here is another analysis for our parents to see, comparing the costs to play a sport at our school, and at another private school in our city:

Athletic Participation Fees
CVCS XYZ School
First Sport 450 1250-1500
Second Sport 400 1050-1300
Third Sport 350 850-1100