2024 Christmas Bake Sale: A Sweet Success

The tables went first—checked cloths, tins with handwritten labels, the air sugar-bright with cinnamon and citrus. Over two festive weeks, from November 27 to December 10, MTIMA’s holiday bake sale did what good community work always does: it turned small gestures into something bigger. The final tally tells the story plainly—CAD $1,200 in revenue against CAD $511 in costs, leaving a net of CAD $689 for MTIMA’s education and healthcare initiatives. That’s roughly 57¢ on the dollar delivered to programs after expenses (about 43¢ to supplies and logistics), an honest return on gingerbread and goodwill.

Numbers aside, the room felt like momentum: trays refilled and emptied, a volunteer swapping oven mitts for a Square reader, a parent explaining why this particular box of cookies mattered more than most. Spread over 14 days, the sale averaged about CAD $86 per day, but the better math is what those dollars do next—print teaching packs, underwrite a workshop hour, help keep a training session free for a clinician who can’t afford to lose a shift.

The best part of the ledger is the names you don’t see—bakers who stayed up late, a donor who quietly covered packaging, the person who came back a second time “just to check” if any lemon bars were left. Fundraising can feel transactional; this never did. It felt like a neighborhood choosing to move in the same direction for a while—and discovering that direction tasted like shortbread.

We’re already sketching the next chapter—new ideas for 2025, including tie-ins with CSE 2025—and we’ll bring the same discipline to the details: clear goals, clean accounting, and a through-line from every dollar raised to the work on the ground. If you baked, bought, volunteered, or simply cheered us on: thank you. You didn’t just sweeten a season; you strengthened a mission.

By the numbers: Revenue CAD $1,200 | Expenses CAD $511 | Net CAD $689 | Net margin ~57.4% | Expense ratio ~42.6%