Food and Toy Drives

System

I wasn't real sure which forum to post this under, so I thought this one might be as good as any. We are gearing up for the holidays and were thinking about doing either a toy or food drive. How successful has this been for some of you guys? How have you chosen a charity?

Our Christmas Party is scheduled for the 1st Friday in December. I thought it would be good to have everyone bring their donations to it, and give them a raffle ticket for a special drawing in return for their donation. This would tie it in more closely with Christmas, not to mention that it would be a LOT easier to deal with to have it over in just one day. Someone else here thinks that it should be done separately so that the Christmas Party would be an event in which we are giving to the employee, with no strings attached. It would be THEIR night only.

What are your thoughts? Has anyone done something different that employees have liked?

DB

One way to do a toy drive, keep it easy and not do it at the Christmas party is to see what help the receiving organization can offer. We do Toys for Tots. We send out a memo and do posters. The donation site is under the holiday tree (holiday tree, not Christmas tree) in the main lobby. Toys for Tots brings in decorated large boxes for collection and they pick everything up on an agreed upon date. It's not hard. See what help other organizations are willing to offer.

Donna

Dianna

We work with a local home for orphans/troubled/endangered kids and do an "Angel Tree", where each one of the kids colors an angel (provided by the home), puts their first name and age on the top, and writes on the bottom of it what they hope to receive for Christmas. Our team members here adopt an angel and bring back a wrapped gift (within a $ limit set by the home), and the home comes and picks them up on a specified day. This has been a huge hit with our team members - they ask about it every year.

Sally

We're a fairly small company (25 adminstrative staff plus 60 musicians in the orchestra). The last two years I've contacted the Fraternal Order of Police around Thanksgiving to get information on a family in need. Our staff has liked this because there is a little more of a personal connection, plus the officers on the street have a good feel for who needs some help. We find out the sizes and needs/wants of the family, and staff members either go shopping or donate cash or checks. The first year two of us met the officer at the family's home to deliver the gifts; last year the officer delivered them for us.
As a couple of side notes--my then 12 year old son went with a co-worker and me when we delivered the gifts. He came away realizing how much he and his siblings have. In the case of the family last year, the mother (a single parent) knew that would be her last Christmas because of how advanced her cancer was. The officer kept us informed the next few months as to how the family was doing. We outdid ourselves last year over the previous year. I'm not sure if it was the circumstances or the staff getting more in the swing of things.

Gerri

Our agency has an "Adopt-a-Family" committee that organizes several functions throughout the year to raise funds for the families we adopt during the holidays. The functions are usually "food events" i.e. bake sales, ice cream socials, chili feeds, salad bars, pie bake-offs, etc. Several people donate food items, then we charge depending on the event for example: salad bar including a roll, beverage and dessert is $3.50. The agency likes this because lunch or treats are available onsite and there's no pressure to contribute. The committee then gets lists from the Salvation Army from the families we are adopting and they take the funds and go shopping for the family. We also put donation boxes in the breakroom - 1 for food items, and 1 for gift items, and staff can contribute there if they wish. We've done this for a number of years and it has worked out really well.

System

I say keep it separate from the party. Where I work, we "adopt" a few families and get very generous responses. A local charity gives us the gender and age of the kids (and parent), along with a wish list and sizes for clothes. It adds a very personal touch.

I'd do a food drive another time of year since so many people give food at Christmas.

James Sokolowski
Senior Editor
M. Lee Smith Publishers

Mikki H

I would also agree to keep this project separate from your own employees' party.

We have always asked for project suggestions from our employees. Our company began with the "Angel Tree" donations that someone saw at the mall, but then felt we wanted more contact with the individuals that benefitted. We began sponsoring our own families since then, found through foster care or the public school system. We have found that the guidance counselors in the schools always have a family or two that they would recommend for sponsorship. We hold our own party for them and have a dinner, sings christmas carols and have gifts for the children, and household goods for the parents. Sometimes the sponsorship has included just getting utilities turned back on. The childrens' party has been our most popular project over the years. But, over the years, we have added other projects like a party at the Boys & Girls Club and a local youth ranch (for trouble teens). We have also visited the juvenile detention in the past. We also provide a "treat" table and hot apple cider for our patients (and employees too) during the holidays. Everyone signs up to bring in home baked goods.

Everyone really gets into the spirit here. We try to get a team leader for each project. We are always open to new suggestions too. Sometimes it seems like a lot of work, but then we realize that some of the children that we sponsor may not be receiving anything else that year, and it keeps us going.

Margaret Morford

One other suggestion we did at a large distribution company was to do our own angel tree. We had people whose spouses were out of work or had just become single parents and could not afford to do Christmas. One other staff member and myself were responsible for keeping the names of the recipiants secret. Employees could call us and suggest that we contact various people that they knew were in need or the employees that had needs could call us. When I contacted an employee that had been identified as having a need, I would tell them that sometimes in life it was our time to give and sometimes in life it was our time to receive, that they could be givers next year when things were better.

We would meet them off site to deliever the presents so no one knew who was in need. The employees loved it because they knew they were helping their fellow employees who might not otherwise have Christmas. The response was so overwhelming that we also had to adopt a few families to give everyone someone to buy for.

Margaret Morford
theHRedge