cmERDC and Impacks Announce Partnership to Help Minnesota Schools

Release Date: 5/11/2021

CMERDC AND IMPACKS ANNOUNCE PARTNERSHIP TO HELP MINNESOTA SCHOOLS

[Saint Cloud, MN, May 1, 2021] The Central Minnesota Educational Research and Development Council (cmERDC) plans to partner with Central MN start-up, Impacks, LLC, to serve schools across the state. cmERDC is a joint powers non-profit organization with a mission of providing cooperative services to public and private schools and school districts. Impacks, LLC, is a mission-based business designed to help schools fundraise while offering parents a convenient way to shop for school supplies online.

cmERDC and Impacks, LLC share a similar goal: support schools in Minnesota by giving them access to resources. cmERDC, formed in 1965, serves over 80 Districts in Minnesota by providing critical services, such as finance, payroll and HR solutions, data warehousing solutions, special education solutions, document imaging services, cooperative purchasing services, and more. Impacks serves partner schools by creating custom-built school website portal pages where parents can go to purchase school supplies. Each school supply pack is customized to the school and grade, and contains nearly everything a child needs for the upcoming school year. At checkout, parents have the option to donate to their schools. Impacks will match the first $5 of each donation as an incentive for parents to give.

In their 2020 pilot year, Impacks partnered with four schools and one non-profit. Partner schools included: Mississippi Heights Elementary, Rice Elementary, Pleasantview Elementary, and Clearview Elementary. Some schools fundraised an average of $9.27 per pack sold, including the $5 match from Impacks. Impacks also partnered with United Way of Central MN to run a summer school supply drive. The drive generated over $6,000-worth in supplies, which were donated to District 742.

cmERDC aims to assist Impacks, LLC in their formative years by providing warehousing and distribution services in St. Cloud, MN. cmERDC will also play a key role in introducing the Impacks solution to the school districts they currently serve. Lastly, cmERDC will assist Impacks through leveraging its cooperative purchasing services on certain supply items – driving cost savings that will be passed on to parents.

Learn more about cmERDC