Labels can mean big money for schools

By WILL STEWART / Staff Reporter for the Southern Standard

WALKER

At 10 and 20 cents a label, it doesn’t seem like much at first, but after a while it really begins to add up. Just ask Irving College Elementary School principal Dr. David Walker.

Last school year, his school netted over $2,000 in cash and equipment from the collection of items such as Campbell’s Soup labels and General Mills box tops for education.

“It’s an ideal type of fundraiser,” he said. “You don’t have to get in people’s faces asking for money and the labels and tops are things people are throwing away. It takes a little bit of preparation, but it’s well worth it. It’s a very easy way to bring in extra funds.”

Irving College is not the only school in the county to have figured this out. Indeed, nearly every school in the system participates in one or more of such passive fundraisers.

At Bobby Ray Elementary, students and parents are encouraged to bring in labels, lids and tops from a variety of Campbell’s, General Mills and Tyson products. Parents are also encouraged to purchase Roger Cares cards, debit card-like products of which a school can receive 5 percent of all purchases made on them.

“People are buying food anyway,” Bobby Ray principal Bonnie Collier said. “This is much better than asking to sell something door-to-door. We’re trying to make people more aware of all of the products which could help us.”

Campbell’s Labels for Education program rewards participating schools with equipment and supplies for labels from their many products, which include not just its soup line, but also Pepperidge Farm, Pace, V8, Prego, and Swanson. Equipment ranges from a world atlas (1,150 labels) to a notebook computer (120,450 labels).

Both General Mills and Tyson chicken give schools cash in exchange for labels. General Mills, which includes such brands as Pillsbury, Hamburger Helper, Betty Crocker and Bisquick, plus a number of breakfast cereals, gives 10 cents per box top.

Tyson chicken will give schools 24 cents per label, 4 cents of which goes to a school’s cafeteria.

“Every little bit helps,” said Hickory Creek Elementary principal Donald Prater, whose school’s PTO coordinates label and box top collections and uses the proceeds to benefit the school’s Accelerated Reader Program.

Other beneficiaries of label and box top collections across the county include supplemental classroom and library materials, playground equipment, physical education equipment and an array of other school necessities.

Said Collier, “There’s always something we need.”

Many county schools collect labels and box tops from the products of several food companies which they can exchange for school equipment and cash. Below is a list of county schools and which companies’ product labels they collect:

• Campbell’s Labels for Education (includes soup line as well as Pepperidge Farm, Pace, V8, Prego and Swanson brands): Bobby Ray, Centertown, Dibrell, Eastside, Hickory Creek, Irving College, Morrison
• General Mills Box Tops for Education (includes such brands as Pillsbury, Hamburger Helper, Betty Crocker and Bisquick, plus a number of breakfast cereals): Bobby Ray, Centertown, Dibrell, Eastside, Hickory Creek, Irving College, Morrison, West
• Tyson A+ (chicken): Bobby Ray, Dibrell, West
• Kingland Foodland (store brand milk tops): Irving College