You said "I can help with the carnival." Now you run every kind of school night.
The fall carnival, the silent auction, the fun run, the book fair, the winter dance — the school year is a season of events run by volunteers with day jobs. This plankit is the committee's whole machine: the plan reshapes for whichever one is next — its own fields, its own vendor slots, its own checklist, its own run-of-night — while ticket and fundraiser money stays right where it is, on your Cheddar Up, your Square, your cash box. No percentage of the parents' money. Ever.
Volunteer shifts, answered from a link
The run-of-night, printed and taped to the table
Zero fees on ticket money
A carnival is not a book fair. A silent auction is not a dance. The playbook knows.
Pick the event and the plan reshapes — fields, vendor slots, budget categories, timeline, and the printouts that night actually needs. Run by the PTA, the PTO, or the one parent who never learned to say no.
Five playbooks
Carnival & fall festival · silent auction night · fun run · book fair · winter dance. Each one preloaded with its own fields, vendor slots, budget lines, and checklist.
Volunteer shifts
Every volunteer answers per shift from their personal link — setup, ticket table, booths, cleanup — with the gaps visible before Friday, not during it. Capped claimable slots included.
Entries & judging
The costume parade, the bake-off, the best-decorated pumpkin — entries with categories, judges' scores and ranks, a drag-to-set running order, and a "6 of 14 judged" counter for the night of.
Everything up to the money
Tickets, dues, and fundraiser dollars stay on the platforms your treasurer already trusts. We plan the event and count the numbers — we never process a dollar, so no fee ever reaches a parent's checkout.
One school event, in pictures.
These are unretouched screenshots of a sample plan we built end to end to show you exactly what it does — a fall carnival in planning. Click any of them to look closer.
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CLICK TO EXPANDThe signup tool vs. the money platforms vs. this.
| SignUpGenius | PTA money platforms (Givebacks, Cheddar Up) | The binder + the group chat | PlanFlow School & PTA | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| What it really is | Volunteer slots — with ads on free, ~$12–$60/mo paid | Payment collection with a platform skim on every transaction | How it actually runs today, until the binder parent moves away | The whole event — playbook, shifts, budget, run-of-night |
| Published pricing | free with ads · paid ~$107.89–$539.89/yr | Givebacks $499–$599/yr + fees per transaction · Cheddar Up free–$35/mo + 3.59–3.95% + $0.59–$0.95 per payment | free — plus the burnout | $149 once, per event · founder $119 |
| Fees on parents' money | 5% + $0.50 per payment collected | platform fee stacked on card fees — "payers cover fees by default" | the cash box, at least, is free | ✓ zero — money stays on YOUR platforms, by design |
| Event playbooks (carnival → dance) | ✗ | ✗ | the binder, if you can find it | ✓ five, preloaded |
| Volunteer shifts | ✓ — its whole job | partial | reply-all roulette | ✓ per-shift RSVPs from each parent's link; capped slots included |
| Entries, running order & judging | ✗ | ✗ | index cards | ✓ entries, categories, scores & ranks — in running order |
| Run-of-night the DJ can hold | ✗ | ✗ | someone's phone notes | ✓ printed, timed, taped to the table |
| Handover when you graduate out | account transfer | account transfer | the binder, again | ✓ next chair inherits the whole archive |
Comparison covers free and paid alternatives using published pricing and official documentation as of July 2026. SignUpGenius, Givebacks, and Cheddar Up are trademarks of their respective owners; PlanFlow Planner is not affiliated with any of them.
Ask your event anything. It drafts — you approve.
Names are scrubbed before anything leaves the Service, and every action is logged.
The kids get one big night — carnival, auction, or dance.
Run it like you mean it. $149.
Founder price $119 for the first 25 schools — or through September 1, 2026, whichever comes first. 30-day money-back — yours through the event + 12 months after. One plankit plans one school event. Running the whole year — carnival, auction, fun run, book fair, dance? The Business Track at $59/mo covers your lane, duplication included; your group's events, every year, one login that outlives every volunteer.
Start the event — $119Founder pricing applied at checkout.
Instant access · scoped committee links included · parents never need an app · ticket money never touches us
What the committee asks.
We collect money on Cheddar Up / Givebacks. Conflict?
Keep them — that's the treasurer's stack, and we designed for the split. They hold the money; we run the event: shifts, entries, timeline, budget-vs-actual. We never process a dollar, which is why nothing on this page has a percentage sign on it.
One plankit per event? We run five a year.
Yes — one plankit plans one event, and the carnival is not the book fair. Do the math first: five school plankits at the founder price is $595, against $649 for a year of the Business Track at $59/mo — so at five, buying them one at a time still wins. The Track pulls ahead at six, or at five once founder pricing closes. What it buys either way: your lane, up to three events open at once, duplication included, and next year's carnival starts 80% done.
What about the students' information?
Handled like everything else here: minimum needed, never sold, never used for ads, and names are stripped before anything reaches the AI advisor — with every AI action requiring human approval. The Privacy Policy has a section specifically on children's data; your principal can read it without a lawyer.
The chair graduates out every June. Then what?
The account belongs to the group, not the parent. Committee members come and go; the archive — what worked, what it cost, which DJ was late — stays. The next chair starts with institutional memory instead of a shoebox.
What does "founder price" mean?
$119 instead of $149 for the first 25 school plankits, or through September 1, 2026 — whichever comes first. One payment, one event — never a subscription, never a cut of the ticket table.