A truck loaded with nearly 15,000 blocks of butter rolled up to the historic country school yesterday afternoon as the climax of a school fundraiser .
"In just three weeks, we sold $59,000 worth of butter," teacher Brittany Morrison said.
"We’ve had success with raffles and other business-backed fundraisers, but we wanted to do something different and we’re not at all interested in making cheese rolls."
The Westgold Butter fundraiser offered 250g butter blocks at $4 each, with $1 from each block going to the school.
"One of our committee heard Mataura Scouts had done it, and suggested it for us.
"We were a little hesitant because a carton of 40 blocks was $160, a big upfront cost, and we had to sell a minimum of 400 blocks, so we told our families if we didn’t meet the minimum we would refund their money."
But the butter was available singly or in bulk, and even when the market price spiked to $5.15 a block, Westgold stuck to the deal to let the school finish its fundraiser at the pledged price.
"It’s been our most successful fundraiser yet."
The resourceful community had a heavy-duty forklift ready to load stacked pallets into the school hall, where excited children, teachers and parents pitched in to prepare the prepaid orders to spread out to families around the region.
"We were going to purchase some headphones and a new basketball hoop," she said.
"As the money raised was far more than what we anticipated, we will be holding a meeting to think carefully about what we will do to most positively impact the school."
