4.  Determine your need for volunteers

At this point you should take a look at how many volunteers your carnival will need. You may be surprised when you start adding up how many people it will take. In addition to your carnival planning committee members, you will need volunteers to:

• Sell tickets before and during the carnival
• Make decorations and signs
• Build games
• Set up and take down games and decorations
• Clean the facility during and after the carnival
• Operate each game (1-2 people per hour the game operates)
• Prepare and sell food
• Distribute prizes

If your need for volunteers is out of line with what you can reasonably expect from your organization, you have three basic choices.

-- Your first option is to scale back on your plans. Fewer games require fewer volunteers. Some games require less work to prepare or run. You could consider renting games rather than making them.

-- Your second option is to recruit volunteers from another organization. Think about the Boy Scouts, a church group, or a local middle or high school.

-- Your third option is to hire some helpers. Think about hiring someone to do the cleaning up (it's always hard to get volunteers for this anyway). Maybe your school's custodian would like the overtime. If you hire an outside vendor for food you would need fewer volunteers in the food area. Maybe the band from the high school is trying to earn some money for uniforms and would love to work with you. We recently had an event where we recruited the high school dance team to run the games. They did a great job and we made a donation to their group. Brainstorm with your committee to find the bodies you need at a price you can afford.

 

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