Party Rental Top 10 – What to rent for your event…

When it comes to deciding what rental items are the perfect solution for your event, take a few minutes to consider what is popular at other peoples parties. This list is based on real experience supplying party rental items to events over a nearly 30 year period. Check out this list to help you know what you need for your next gathering!

1. Tables
2. Chairs
3. Bounce houses
4. Carnival Games
5. Sound System
6. Tents – Canopies
7. Concession Machines
8. Inflatable Slide
9. Mechanical Bulls
10. Decor Items

Those are the popular party rental items- but here are some more comprehensive lists of things we see getting rented:

Party and Event Support Rentals

– Tents

– Tables

– Chairs

– Linens

– Temporary Heaters

– Temporary Lighting

– Temporary Floors

– Fencing

– Generators, Power Services

– Sound Systems

– Digital Jukeboxes

– Balloons

– Decor

– Promotional Items

– Promotional Inflatables

– Inflatable Arches

– Dance Floors

– Stages

Party Entertainment Rentals

– Game Rentals

– Inflatable Rentals

– Video Game Rentals

– Carnival Games

– Picnic Games

– Arcade Games

– Table Games

– Interactive Games

– Carnival Rides

– Water Slides

– Dunk Tanks

– Jump Houses

– Inflatable Slides

– Hi Strikers

– Mechanical Bulls

– Ferris Wheels

– Spin Rides

– Mobile DJ’s and Emcees

– Clowns

– Face Painters

– Kids Games

– Arts and Craft Activities

– And more!

Planning a party? Top 10 Things to consider:

1. Do you have a theme?
2. How Many people are coming?
3. What will be going on at the party?
4. Where is the party to be held?
5. What kind of food options will be provided (by whom)?
6. What kind of budget do you have?
7. How long is the party or event?
8. Is there enough parking?
9. Are there enough bathrooms?
10. What about entertainment?

Party Rental companies come in all shapes and sizes- here are are some ways to make sure you are picking a quality provider:

1. Call a provider and talk to them about your event, a reputable provider will be able to provide you with a quote either over the phone, or in many cases for larger rental orders via email, fax, or in some kind of typed format.
2. Check that your provider is licensed to do business. Ask if they are, and check with your states corporation division to determine if the provider is in fact a legitimate business. There are many people who simply offer party rentals part time or as a second income- if your event is important to you, you will want to make sure you are contracting a professional, full time, event or party rental company.
3. Ask to see a certificate of insurance for the company. Many of the smaller part time businesses, and some of the large rental companies out there do not carry insurance. You need to verify that you are doing business with a legitimate provider, who has insurance to protect you, them, and your guests from any unplanned accidents or occurrences.
4. Get an invoice + service agreement. Sign it, date it, and return the agreement to the company. Without a signed agreement, chances are you do not have a contract. Be sure to read your invoice and agreement carefully- if you do not check to verify all the items you have on your party rental order are on the invoice, then do not be surprised when something does not make it to your event…
5. Check Date, Time, Contact and Event location information on the agreement/invoice. Any information likle this can cause huge issues if it is incorrect. The day of the event, you want the right information on the invoice as that is what the party rental company will use to get to your location. A wrong address, combined with a wrong phone number can create a nightmare…

No matter what you rent for your party, the list above is important to follow.

Developing a Price List for your Courier Business is more than critical, it should be ready before your business cards. So, when you are 1st getting into the market as a new business, what’s the plan? How much can I charge and still get the business? Is it enough to make a profit and can I grow the business on that profit margin or just survive? Let’s take a look at some ideas.

Know your Market. You first need to take a look at the competition. What are their base prices for local deliveries and what do they charge per mile for a delivery? Do they have different pricing for Small Vehicles and Vans? (Trucks are a different pricing structure entirely) Do they charge for Attempts? Do they charge for Wait Time? Do they charge for weight and number of packages? What about additional stops on the same run? Are they including fuel surcharges, after hours surcharges, etc. to their bills and do they add a late fee to their past due invoices? Do some good detective work and get a copy of their price sheets if at all possible.

Base price: This is the price you charge for a delivery usually within a 25 mile radius of your base location. You may go 1 mile or the full 25 miles but the charge is the same. Many companies simply use the base charge as their home base City and use a flat rate for the entire City (depending on the size, of course.) This is an important price, however, because often times more than 50% of your business will be done here. If you under price or over-price this “You Lose”.

Charge per Mile: This one has some bumps in it. Your per mile charge must be competitive and reflect the market you are working in. Some areas get more per mile and some less. It depends on where you live. At the date of this writing, I see per mile charges of from $1.35-$2.25 per mile in various areas. What you have to decide is what price your customer can live with, while allowing you to make a living, keep up the maintenance and pay for the gas. If you pick the wrong number “You Lose”.

Surcharges: There are many different types of surcharges. The most common are Fuel surcharges, After Hours surcharges, Additional Man, Equipment, Airport, Holiday, and more.

The Fuel surcharge is one of the more important ones in today’s environment. It is there in order to allow your per mile rate to remain stable while being able to adjust for the rising cost of fuel. At this time the average fuel surcharge is 15%-22%, depending on your market. That is the percentage you add to the base total of each delivery.

Next is the After Hours surcharge. It is common for a company to increase their charges by a percentage or a flat additional fee after regular business hours as in after 6PM through 6AM.

How about Holiday surcharges? The best way to determine what holidays is to use the schedule of the largest Courier Company in the World FedX. If they are not running, then you charge a Holiday surcharge. Get a schedule from FedX and list those Holiday dates on your price list/sheet. The amount is generally a flat rate often $25 or more.

Airport surcharges: As a time-critical courier, often times you will be going to the airport to pickup or deliver. The airport can be a bottomless pot hole that drivers get lost in. The plane is delayed, the lines are long, the agent isn’t there, the forms need to filled out properly, all of which takes extra time and effort. Therefore, you add a flat additional fee to your base price, every time you go the the airport. Often that will be $5-$25 depending on your situation.

Past Due Fees: Many companies feel that if they charge a late fee for payments, they will lose their customer. I can’t deny that this may happen, but better they leave you owing $100 than $5,000. It has happened to me with some of the best, so do what all their other vendors do, charge them if they are late, whether that is 30, 45 or 60 days, you have decide what your terms will be.

Attempts: On occasion, you will arrive to pickup a package and it won’t be ready or you will go to deliver a package and no you will be able to sign for it and receive it. That is an attempt. It takes you as long to do that as it does to actually finish the job, so you charge a fee for your time and effort. Most companies charge from 50% to 100% of the original price for an attempt. Do not do your customers any favors here unless you feel you must. Your time must equate to $$$$ too.

Additional Man/Equipment surcharges: For some deliveries, you may need some special equipment, such as furniture blankets, special hand trucks, straps or lifts. These all come at a price to you and you must pass that on to your customer. The amounts to charge here vary far to much for me to add any advise but cover your cost and add a percentage of profit to it. Also, on some occasions, you may need to send an extra man to help with a load. When you do, develop a reasonable hourly rate and start the clock from the time he gets in the vehicle until the job is done and he returns.

Weight and Number of Packages: When you charge flat rates, you must assume that there is a weight limit on that rate before you add to the charge. Also, the same applies to the number of packages. So in your price list/sheet, tell the customer what that limit is. For example, this price good for the 1st 200 lbs. Over that $00.?? per pound additional. Or the same with the number of packages. this price good for the 1st 3 packages, after that $??.?? per package additional.

Additional Stops: When you pickup several packages at the same location to deliver for the same customer, they usually expect a break in the price. Now this applies only if it is within the same city or 25 mile radius area, for example. It’s common to charge 50% for the additional deliveries. If those deliveries are in other areas, then it is at full rate.

Wait Time: Deliveries don’t always go like clockwork. Their are times that a package isn’t ready when you arrive, their are times you must wait for someone to sign or can’t find the person to sign. That’s when Wait Time kicks in. Usually, you allow the customer 15 minutes per location to affect the pickup or delivery. After that you charge per minute Wait Time. That fee is usually from $30-$40 per hour broken down into minutes.

Van Pricing: All I will say at this point is that all of the above, although meant to address small vehicles such as cars and small trucks, also applies to Vans. Except, the base charge, mileage charges and several other surcharges need to be adjusted due to the increased cost of operation.

Keep your Price List updated at all times. Make it look neat and professional. Have it ready to hand out OFTEN! Make sure it is easy to read and gives the customers what he needs to pick you as his Courier Service.

All of these surcharges must be listed on your price list/sheet and the customer must be fully aware of the charges. NO SURPRISES or “You Lose”.

Make your Courier Service Business the one that will dominate your market.

PLEASE READ: Our complete list is now posted and available for free at a website of one of our business clients (see below for web address). On this website you will also find additional surplus and salvage sources, wholesale liquidators information, and information on specific suppliers that deal in wide variety of niche items as well as general wholesale and surplus merchandise.

Reason we decided to post our list on a site rather than e-mail it as we have done for the last 7 years is because we have been getting an overwhelming amount of requests – over 100 per day, on average, and it has become impossible to keep up. We are allowed to update our list through the site, so mark it and visit from time to time. If you want to add a company to the list, post a comment, and we will get notified of your post and will request for site owner to update the list.

We are still seeing an increased number of those who requested our free list – formatting it in a cleaner format and selling on eBay. The number of these SHAMELESS PEOPLE IS NOW 200+ eBay sellers that are selling our list for $9.95 – $19.95. WHAT A SHAME!!! SHAME ON ALL OF YOU!!! To add to that, We are STILL receiving quite a few nasty e-mails from some eBay sellers – specifically those that SELL similar lists on eBay, questioning as to why we chose to undermine their “business” and give our list away. Well, to all those RUDE people who sent us and continue sending us e-mails: We have given our list to over 100000 people so far, and will CONTINUE to give it out. This is our right, so please STOP wasting your time sending us silly e-mails. You can also STOP voting “NO” for this guide. This guide has been viewed by way too many people already, voted on and indexed in Google search for helpfulness, so your negative ratings will have ZERO impact

We are tired of people trying to rip off honest buyers by selling them obsolete, recycled or otherwise common information lists. True, these sources are not easy to find, but with some research, it is easy enough. While there is not much we can do to stop this practice, we can give you our own list for FREE. Thats right, FREE.

Why, you may ask? Well, first of all healthy competition is great. Secondly, we have found our niche over 19 years ago, and cannot put this list to its full use. We do hope that you find it useful, and maybe even valuable. We know for a fact that this list contains the same exact wholesalers and drop shippers that other ebayers sell for 19.99, and some up to 29.99

Here is our list of various tried and true wholesalers, distributors and drop shippers. Nothing hidden. You get whatever information we have available regarding the source. Website, telephone number, mailing address, fax, e mail, etc.

Use it as you see fit, and if you find even ONE useful source from this list,

you can now find our wholesale suppliers and dropshipping sources list here:

Genuine Wholesale Suppliers of 1.6 million products like Electronics, fashion, DVDs, Designer Handbags, Clothing, Shoes & Accessories etc from hundreds of brands, Beginners who don’t know how to find a supplier for eBay, and don’t know which products they should sell online.

[UPDATE 2021] Top Dropshipping Suppliers for eBay, Amazon, Shopify

Please click the link below for registration

+ Internet’s largest database of verified wholesalers and drop shippers

+ Guarantees to give you the sources you are looking for

+ Exclusive Case Study: How a new online retailer is making over $3million turnover by using this directory and drop shipping (full case study available to members).

+ Over 8,000+ verified wholesalers, drop shippers, branded goods distributors and manufacturers

+ Over 3,000+ true drop shippers and growing

+ Over 1,000 new sources verified every month

+ Over 2,000+ government auction sources

+ Unlimited research: need even more top sources? Get unlimited research reports based on your requirements.

+ Find profitable products locally at cheaper than China prices (without having to pay for duties and long shipping times)

+ Longest established verified directory service in the US

+ Free Courses on how to create a successful eBay business ($97 value)

+ Free eBay Business Handbook, the ultimate guide to making money on eBay;

+ Free eBay Market Research Lab.

Please click the link below for registration

https://bit.ly/Drop-ShippingDirectory

As a tennis club owner.

You need to focus on getting your staff to grow your email list daily and to do that, they will have to take consistent daily action.

Before we get into the tips.

Let’s take a look at why you want to be doing this in the first place and have your staff focus all their attention on doing it.

“With a huge email list, you can offer great discounts or something for free and then upsell your members”.

You can use email to drive more traffic to your club during the weekday during slow times.

Also, you could use affiliate offers and cash in on them!

We could go on and on, but you get the message.

Now, here are 3 tips to start with that can help you start building your email list.

1) Collect Their Email Offline.

This is the easiest and first one that you need to start doing.

Instruct your staff to collect everybody’s email that comes to your club.

And that means everybody.

Give away a cheap tennis gift or something, but do whatever you have to, to get their email and then import those emails into an auto-responder.

(I use Mailchimp and it is free to sign up and they allow you to get up to 5000 members before they charge you)

Which is a great deal!

Okay next.

2) Offer A Free Event.

This is another great way to build your email list.

Hold a free event and ask your members to invite their friends and family to attend.

I would give free clinics in the morning and then have a round robin in the afternoon and finish the event off with a free BBQ. (Nothing expensive, just hot dogs and hamburgers)

Then make sure that you have every person that comes, who isn’t a member sign a form and give their email address.

Sorry, let’s take it even further than that.

Have them give their telephone number and address.

This way.

You can use direct mail and stay in touch with them with more offers in the future.

With this tip, you can actually use it to triple your memberships in no time at all.

By the way, it’s also my favored one of them all.

Last tip.

3) Use YouTube.

Upload videos and then ask for their email in return for a free visit to your club or eBook,

YouTube is the one marketing channel that many clubs aren’t using.

And the ones who are using it, never use an auto-responder and some don’t even add their websites.

Just check out some of their videos.

YouTube gets you backlinks and if you use the right keywords.

Many of your videos will appear on the first page on Google.

Your club can use video testimonials and promotions.

But make sure that you add an auto-responder in the description part.

These are really the only 3 things that you need to do to grow your email list.

And here is the best part.

By doing this weekly or monthly, the activities will build on each other and you will continue to grow your list and your membership!!

You can then maintain your growth by using a referral system.

Are you getting frustrated trying to generate leads to build your business online?

I know how you feel. No doubt, you have heard The Money Is In The List… build your list to build your business. But exactly how to you generate leads and build your list on the Internet?

I have a secret for you… there are at least a thousand ways to generate leads online, and most of them are not worth the effort. However, here are the top 6 ways to generate leads and market on today’s Internet:

1. Article Marketing

2. Forums and Blogs

3. eBay Classifieds

4. Press Releases

5. PPC marketing

6. Joint Ventures

WARNING: Everyone is hung up on lead generation, but all lead generation and list building techniques are basically worthless unless you have a way to capture your leads and follow up with them automatically.

The best way to capture leads is with a squeeze page. A squeeze page is a website that offers valuable free gifts or services so a prospect will enter his name and email address to join your email list. And the best way to automatically communicate with your leads is a good autoresponder which is software that resides on your website server and automatically sends a series of emails according to a schedule you define in advance.

If you want to build your business and your potential customer list, focus your efforts on the top 6 proven methods for lead generation listed above, and be sure to get the best autoresponder service that meets your business needs.

Have you ever noticed that the products that are advertized to teach you how to do opt-in list building seem to focus on the “size” of the list you can build rather than on the “quality” of the list you build? Certainly size is important, but equally important is the “quality” of your email list. If you have a huge list of “window shoppers”, it translates into little financial benefit to you. In opt-in list building, what you are looking for is a quality list of people who love and trust you and are anxious to buy from you because of the huge value you have already given them.

I’m on the opt-in lists of several (or more!) home based internet business building gurus. I find myself liking their products so much that I risk getting far more than I can profitably use. How many of you know what I’m talking about? The secret is in the quality of your opt-in list building.

Why Worry About the Quality of List Building?

You’ve got to grasp the concept that quality matters more than quantity in list building for making money on the internet. Suppose you have two Toyota car dealerships. The first mails its announcement of inventory clearing sales to the people of the neighborhood, 50,000 of them. Most of them drive cars and need new cars periodically. The second dealer has carefully collected a list of 50,000 current owners of Toyotas in the area. Which of these two dealers would sell the most cars? The answer is obvious.

The dealer who has a mailing list of current Toyota owners has a “quality list.” His niche is much better defined.  On his list are many who love Toyota and realize they need to turn in their old model for a new one. They will figure that now is the best time to do so. He risks making ten times as much money out of his publicity as the dealer who mails to the average resident of his neighborhood. Many of them love their own car model and are not willing to change even though they need a newer car.

How To Improve Quality in Opt-in List Building?

·         Build a list that belongs to you and not to some other company. You see, it’s possible to make money by driving traffic to the site of an affiliate. Suppose  you are promoting a certain network marketing business. The people you attract to make purchases or to join up with your team become the list of your company, not your own list. They develop a loyalty to that company. If one day you decide to change companies, they don’t leave with you. They are attached to that company. Hence your list is not really yours but the company’s you are affiliated with.

·         Build a list based on a common interest or niche. Ask yourself, “Are the people on my list prospective customers?” Are they interested in the products or services that you offer? Is your list target specific? This is why you need to have a clearly defined niche that you are targeting. The clearer your “yes” to these questions, the better quality your list.

·         Build a relationship with the people on your list, a trust relationship. It’s been rightly said that “people only buy things from people they know and trust.”   They don’t buy from sales pages. As you know, it takes time to build relationship and trust in the real world and the same is true for the internet.   You therefore increase the quality of your list the more you reveal yourself and the more you show your generosity through surpassing their expectations with the quality of information or products you give them. It’s what we call the “wow” factor. As you “bold them over” with what you give them, they become more and more willing to buy from you. You must communicate that you value the people on your list, their opinions and their well-being. 

·         A quality list is an up-to-date list. It takes time and energy to constantly keep up with changes of address, deaths, etc. A list that is up-to-date is a better quality list than one that is neglected and out-of- date.

·         A quality list is one built through your own site and through your own value exchange. There are many who offer to sell you a list. There is no way that this kind of list can be quality the way we are defining it. How can such a list be well targeted to meet your needs? Furthermore, those on the list have no personal attachment or loyalty to you.

So to summarize, opt-in list building is at the heart of building a profitable internet business. The size of the list is important but the quality of the list is even more important. Those of you who are just starting an internet business need to get building your list as soon as possible, but aim at building a quality list. By quality I mean an up-to-date list of people who share your interests and are growing in relationship to you because of the value you give them.

To further understand what building a list is all about see the other two parts to this series of three articles on “opt-in list building.” The first article defines exactly what list building is and gives you several images to better visualize the role of opt-in list building. The other article explains why it is that list building must be a priority if you want to make good money through online business building. 

One of the key reasons that many webmasters don’t switch their business model from the traditional to the more modern is that they don’t know exactly how to get started. They don’t know how to drive more traffic to their web site. If you’re running a site and you want to start driving more traffic to a blog or website, here are some tips that you can use to get started quickly. The following tips will work for all types of businesses and industries but are specifically focused on email marketing.

1. Make sure that your email lists are good

Make sure that you keep your email lists updated. Don’t make the mistake of purchasing email lists from a company that you think might be reliable. If the email list is out of date, then the email has possibly been sold multiple times by the company. This means that those addresses will be sold multiple times over again and you’ll end up sending your promotions to a bad list of people.

2. Don’t spam your audience

This is the number one point on not only the list but on the business plan that you must follow. If you send out emails to people that don’t want them then there will be nothing to sell from your email list. You’ll be wasting your time and your money sending out emails to people who don’t want them sent out. You can use a bulk email sender software service to send out your emails from anywhere in the world but you need to ensure that you are sending your emails to individuals that have specifically requested to get emails from your site.

3. You need a good offer – You have to give something free in exchange for the reader to visit your site. In a traditional system of business, an employee would give a presentation (or a training) to a potential customer and this was the way to build relationships. This is also how to build a list of email addresses. You can offer a newsletter (or lessons) free of charge but also encourage the reader to forward your message on to friends (so you can build the list) or you can offer a book or CD or DVD or VHS tape or other item that will be of interest to them. The point is to give value to your offer to the customer in exchange for visiting your site.

4. Be careful when you send out emails – Some people will think that the email you send out is a spam message and will report it as such. This may even affect your website. It might make the recipients think that you hate them because you’re trying to get emails. So be careful when you send out emails to your mailing list.

The key to being successful when you build mailing lists is being a trustworthy person in return for the trusting email addresses that you can use to market your products. This is the same principle behind how the big retail companies build list and also the same principle that online companies should use. The only difference is that instead of emailing on a piece of paper, you are sending out the message over the internet and you are asking for the trust of the recipient.

If you finally convinced yourself to give Master Cleanse a shot, you need to gather the Master Cleanse ingredients. The things needed for this detoxifying diet are really not that hard to find. Actually, you can find some of the items inside your pantry.

So, what do you need to write on your shopping list?

Fresh Lemons

Yes, fresh lemons. Without lemons, this diet would not be called Lemonade Diet, right? It is the most important ingredient. Without it, you can’t even start this diet. Well, you can probably use lime but that’s another topic.

Organic lemons are the best lemons that you can buy. No pesticides are used to grow the organic lemons. Thus, it is our first choice. However, if you really cannot find the organic ones, you can just use regular lemons. Just make sure that you never use the canned or powdered lemon juice.

If you plan to drink twelve glasses of lemonade juice per day, you will need 6 lemons a day. If you are doing the cleanse for 10 days, you will be needing 60 lemons. Now, that’s a lot!

Maple Syrup

There are different grades of Maple Syrup in the market but you need Grade B Maple Syrup for this diet. Make sure that you check the label to make sure that it’s Grade B and not Grade A. Take not, you need the real maple syrup and not the maple-flavored ones. The Pancake syrup or the Maple-flavored syrup contains just a small amount of maple syrup.

Cayenne Pepper

I know that this ingredient is a little weird. But you need a pinch of cayenne for your lemonade juice. This is not repulsive as it sounds. It actually makes the lemonade juice delicious. However, it is not added just for the flavor. It is an important ingredient since it warms the body. It provides extra energy plus it helps in breaking up the mucus.

Salt

You need sea salt for the Master Cleanse Diet. Note, that this salt is not for the lemonade juice but for the salt water flush. Never buy the iodized ones or table salt. You have to use non-iodized salt.

Laxative Tea

Every night during the Master Cleanse, laxative tea should be taken. It helps individuals in eliminating. Senna tea is highly recommended. However, this tea causes stomach ache for some people. If you really don’t need help in moving bowels, you can look for senna tea which is composed of 25% leaves and 75% pods. The pods are less potent, so this kind of tea wouldn’t be too harsh to your stomach.

Water

The only rule for the water used in Master Cleanse is that fluoridated water should not be used. Also, it must be in room temperature.

Listening to the voice mail from my brother-in-law, on our cellphone, my stomach dropped, and my mouth was suddenly dry. We had just finished a glorious morning of hiking with some good friends in the California desert. After hiking, we had indulged in some delicious Mexican food, including fresh salsa, real guacamole and some ice-cold beer.

Now, I was listening to a message that our 11-year old black Labrador had been missing for 24-hours!

My heart sank. We were spending Christmas and New Years in California with friends. She was staying in the comfort of her Calgary home with her favourite dog-walker. She is a dog a well-loved dog that enjoys a good life. What inspired her to sneak out of the back gate on a sunny afternoon, the day after Christmas, we will never know. She is a pure bred Labrador, driven by her stomach and her love of people. So it is possible she left in search of Christmas left-overs.

Our story has a happy ending, she arrived home safe and sound. However, it was 72 hours of hell for all those involved. Our fabulous dog-sitter and my brother-in-law were tireless in their efforts to find her. They put many miles on their feet and spent hours driving around. By the time, we received the call they had done almost everything that is suggested when you lose a pet.

Pet lovers understand that dogs and cats are really part of the fabric of a family. The loss of a pet can be just as devastating and disruptive as losing a loved one. We endured a couple of sleepless nights and spent hundreds of dollars in roaming charges on our cellphones.

Now that, our household is back to normal I thought that I would share this checklist, so others may have a guide if they find themselves in a similar situation. The list is not an official City of Calgary list but we hope it helps others find their dogs and other lost animals.

1. Do not panic your pet does not actually realize that they are lost.
2. ASAP call the City of Calgary Animal Services @ 311. They will ask you to file a report with all of the pertinent details; breed, age, weight, colour, tattoo, microchip etc.
3. Follow the checklist that is available on the Calgary Humane Society web site and register on their PetLynx site. You can do this anytime, ideally before your pet is lost.
4. Call the vets in your local area, to let them know in case your animal is hurt or someone brings them in.
5. Make lots of posters, they do not need to be professionally done. The posters should include all the key information and how to get a hold of you. Print many copies and then give them to neighbours, put them in the dog parks, attach them to posts, trees and anything else where people might see easily spot them.
6. Talk to your neighbours and let them know that your pet is missing.
7. Place ads in the local papers and media such as The Calgary Herald 403-235-0511, The Calgary Sun 403-250-4222 and Shaw TV 403-716-6010 which, offer free online ads for lost pets.
8. Leverage social media, make use of Facebook, Twitter, SMS, blogs and any other sites to get the message out.
9. Contact the local dog walkers. These are the people who are out almost everyday walking the neighbourhood parks. Use Google for your local area to get a comprehensive list.
10. Reach out to your local community association(s) as they may have a website or email distribution list.
11. Do not panic and do not give up!

Please note: this specific list is for Calgary. Your local area will have similar organizations and communication tools.

You can buy the tools that you don’t already have as you get to them in the book or you can go ahead and buy them all at once. In the article below I give suggestions as to sizes and styles that can help children get the most out of their use. The advantage in having all your tools ahead of time is that it will save you from having to run around trying to find what you’ll need the day before you start a new project just to find out it’s sold out. Another advantage is you can often times find all the tools you need online at one site. This can save you time and money.

Here is a list of tools you’ll need. Use this to compare what you already have to what you’ll need to purchase. You can buy each child their own set (which would be nice since one of the first projects is a tool box) or they can share tools. (But getting kids to do that is an entire book unto itself.)

A. Measuring Tape (12′) they make measuring tapes that have the fractions labeled on the tape to make it easier to read especially if your child is just learning about fractions.

B. Ruler (12″) wooden ones are easier to read than the clear or colored plastic ones.

C. Hammer (7 – 10oz for smaller children, 16oz for older children with better hand eye coordination)

D. Screwdrivers: flathead and Phillips

E. Nail set

F. Handsaw (western or Japanese style)

G. Coping saw

H. Block plane

I. Brace Drill (Hand drill)

J. Rasp

K. Sandpaper (100, 120, 150, 180 grits)

L. Glue (white or yellow) water proof for outdoor projects

M. Screws and nails (a box each of 1 ¼” and 1 5/8″ drywall screws and a box each of 3d, 4d, and 6d finish nails will get you through most projects in this book).

N. Clamps (See the lesson on building the step stool for information on clamps).

O. Safety glasses (it may take some extra effort, but find a pair that fits your child. They will become frustrated quickly if every time they start to swing a hammer they have to push their glasses back up on their noses. Manufactures do make child size glasses it just might take some looking around to find them.)

P. Combination square

Q. Speed square

Again, this isn’t a complete list of the hand tools needed to build any project imaginable, but it’s a great start. Armed with the above list of hand tools you can conquer all the projects in our book, “Woodshop 101 for Kids”