Penguin Patch Holiday Shop — Local services in Keller

My name is Kristy Melendez. I work at Robins K-8 School and before I worked here I was PTO president for 2 years and then became the Community Liaison. I have worked with 4 other “holiday shop” companies. Penguin Patch is by far the best. So when Kandice called me and asked me to share my experience with you, I was more than happy to do so. I don’t know if you have worked with other companies before so I will just tell you the reasons why I love Jenny’s Penguin Patch. To start the owner of the company was a PTO member for many years so she knows what it is like to be in our position. Therefore they are the easiest and most helpful company to work with. They do not make you count inventory EVER! Not on the way in or out. This saves tons and tons of time for you and your volunteers. Not to mention stress of getting all the numbers right. Jenny’s has a price code on all their items. That was when your students come to check out the volunteer working the checkout does not have to try to figure out how much it is. Other companies do not do this. You have to have the students keep a list of what they are going to purchase and bring the written list along with the items to the check out. What a mess! Let me tell you it was SO hard to do it that way. Jenny’s also sends you price cards to place by the items and posters of the price codes to make it easier for students to know how much things are. Jenny’s sends you a folder with step by step instructions and even a timeline to help you make sure you have everything done when it needs to be. In it there are even template letters to send home to get volunteers! We got lots of help from parents by sending that letter. Other companies do not do these things. Another thing I really liked is they sent us an extra box of merchandise that we placed in a closet room that students who could not afford to shop could pick some items from. Love that! Again other companies do not do this. Then to top it all off at the end of your shop you go on their website and input the money you collected and it does all the math for you. Tells you how much to send in. You box up the remaining inventory and send them a check. Other companies require you to count inventory, send back damaged items, and calculate bill yourself! Jenny’s is always checking in with you before, during, and after to see if you need help. They have awesome customer service and that is very important when you are trying to run such...

Our school has used Penguin Patch for the last several years. They have always been easy to work with UNTIL they were not. We had a change in our PTO board last year and it was not clear if we had renewed our contract or not. I logged on to our school's dashboard with Penguin Patch and was able to see last years date, no information regarding a current contract and there was a tab to Re-Sign. One would ASSUME with this information, we did not have a pending contract. There was NO communication via email or phone calls, until OCTOBER when UPS sent a notification that a package had been shipped. Upon calling PP to investigate, I was informed we did have a contract and we missed the cancelation date by 5 days. If there had been ANY communication, we would have canceled our contract in a timely manner. But since we didn't, we were notified we would be charged $500 for cancelation. FINALLY, after 1.5 hours on the phone, A customer rep was able to work with me to ship the products and allow us to sell $500 in product and ship the rest back. Penguin Patch company prides themselves on being a cost effective option for students and schools, I have to disagree. I was told numerous times "this is for the students", but I feel, their intentions are misplaced, misleading, and over all dishonest. This year, our school decided to purchase higher quality items in bulk, through multiple vendors. We had MANY compliments on the quality of items compared to the past, we tripled our profit, and our cash sales were less than previous years with PP. We are a title 1 school with 250 students. I find it absurd a company that claims to be "for the students" would want to charge us a $500 fee. There are so many options out there, I'm glad we took a chance and discovered options outside of...

My daughter spent $20 on $3 worth of tiny junk toys. The items were likened to tiny cheap child party goody bag toys. I was very disappointed at the quality of these items. I understand that the shop is meant to be a fun inexpensive way for the little ones to purchase items for their family and friends and that it is also a school fundraiser, but my goodness, the poor things are being ripped-off. The items are literally worth pennies on the dollar and the kids are sent home with little plastic toy pieces no bigger than the palm of their hand. Plus they do not even give receipts to show what the child purchased and how much it costed... as far as I know, $5 worth of items could have been purchased, while the other $15 pocketed by someone. This holiday shop could offer better items for the money spent and proof of purchase with any change sent home with child. The merchandise selected specifically for moms, dads, siblings, etc... are tiny trinket toy quality. A child can do better shopping for 4 people at Walmart for $20. I will keep the items to save from the hassle of trying to go through the school PTA to return the items for a refund. However, I will surely know better next time. You live and learn. Beware if you ever receive a Penguin Patch Shop flyer from your little...