Raising funds without children selling

This is my first time to post an entry. Hope it will be useful. I'm a grandmother of a 2nd and 4th grader and have been in PTA at least half my life and, trust me, that's a long time:-). First let me say that grandparents are probably one of our biggest untapped resources. I hope to remedy that in our school.

Now for fundraising which I am chairman of for our PTA. I wanted a continuous income stream and, having had a booth in an antique mall some years ago, I thought that just might work and it has. We call it Panda Place since our mascot is the Panda. We are a K-5 school. The booth is in a new "mini mall" , a 10'x10' space which rents for $110/month. This rent is paid by a PTA supporter. Parents, grandparents, friends, even strangers can donate items to the booth for resale. We ask that they be new or "like new" to be considered. If not appropriate we donate to a local charity with the permission of the donor. We are tax exempt and so I write a thank you note to each donor and enclose a receipt to be used for tax purposes. 

The mall owner provides heating and cooling and check out so that we don't have to physically be there except to add new items. The key to success is to have someone willing to manage it and to take the items as they are donated.

I have people drop things off at my house. I decide which I think will sell, record them in a notebook with an inventory number, the price, and the donor's name. I then put a price tag/sticker on them and I (with help) put them on display.

We started the booth last August 15th and by December we had $2400.00. To date, our total sales have been right at $5000.00. Summer has been slow but it will pick back up once school starts back.