HOW many volunteers does it take to run a tuckshop? More than it used to, thanks in part to a diet of healthier food in schools.

With modern lifestyles also contributing to a growing shortage of willing parents, tuckshops starved of enough volunteers could be forced to increase prices to employ serving staff.

Others, like the tuckshop at Samford State School in Brisbane's north, could be left with no option but to close.

Tuckshop conveners say Queensland's Smart Choices healthy food campaign has put extra pressure on the volunteer effort, with more people needed to make fresh food than "to take a pie out of a freezer".

Queensland Association of School Tuckshops executive services manager Chris Ogden, who is spearheading a campaign this year to help conveners attract more volunteers, estimated that up to half of the state's tuckshops struggled with the issue.

She said a variety of reasons was behind the famine of volunteers, including a change in the way Generation Y volunteered and the economic pressure for both parents to work.

She said most tuckshops now paid staff to keep them running and the less volunteers there were, the more danger there was of prices increasing.

"The work is going to have to be done. We still want to provide healthy food and food preparation takes people, basically," Ms Ogden said.

"It does take fewer volunteers to take a pie out a freezer and put it into a pie warmer than it does to make lovely salads."

But she said tuckshops that had come up with plans on how to deliver tasty, easy to prepare healthy food were flourishing.

She said Samford State School was the only tuckshop she knew of that had closed following staffing issues.

Samford State School principal Trevor Walker said his school examined the viability of their tuckshop last year "as it was becoming increasingly difficult to engage" volunteers.

"A P&C meeting will be held on March 28 to discuss the tuckshop's future," he said.

The tuckshop had sold drinks and ice blocks in the past fortnight, but he hoped to restore a more complete service "as soon as possible", he said.

At Ferny Grove State High School, co-convenor Melissa O'Neill said they were lucky to have a large number of parents to call on, but even they had trouble.

"The tuckshop needs you," she urged parents. "Even if it is just once a month for an hour or two. We can get by on that."

Ms O'Neill said the experience helped connect parents with their school community and their child.

A volunteer workshop will feature at this year's Tuckshop and Uniform Shop Trade expo on March 19 at the RNA showgrounds. For more information go to www.qast.org.au

Originally published as School tuckshops starved of help