What an incredible day. Today was the #SantaStork2017 giving day. It really does get more extraordinary every single year.

We started early and loaded up all the gifts that we’d collected thanks to your support.

Lots of cars and a van were loaded up and taken to the hall we’d booked for our giving day.

Thanks to all your help, generosity and support, we were ready to pass out gift bags filled to the brim with goodies for 874 children and 385 of their parents and carers – isn’t that fantastic!

UPDATE: including the last minute requests we were able to give out gift bags for 1040 children and 438 of their parents and carers. 

The referral sources we work with came and collected the presents they’d requested for the families they support. All the presents were brand new and, in almost all cases, were items that the family or children has specifically requested.

Goods valuing £38,000 have been distributed, and they were sent with the very best wishes from everyone involved in supporting the campaign.

We were delighted to welcome Cllr Barbara Thomson and show her the wrapping day in full flow!

It was humbling to talk to the professionals about the difference the gifts would make; professionals who are supporting vulnerable local families all year around. We heard so many stories about how the gifts being collected were literally the only things the children would receive on Christmas Day.

Without Santa Stork, and your kindness, these local children wouldn’t be receiving anything.

We had a full house of ‘wrapping elves’ today, with help from a record number of people. It was so good to see lots of regular Stripey Stork faces, as well as plenty of new ones, particularly from some of the corporate teams who’ve helped us with our collections this year.

We’re very grateful to those who took time out of their busy schedule to come and lend a hand. You can’t beat #TeamStork for team spirit and there was a wonderful atmosphere in the hall.

We were also delighted to be speaking with That’sTV Surrey today who kindly came along to see the culmination of #SantaStork2017 after they featured our launch back in October.

You can watch their feature here:

https://youtu.be/pWLJkm00jyY

We were also featured on BBC Radio Surrey this morning on this link, which if you go to 1 hour 23 minutes you’ll hear Chief Elf Lauren speaking about Nicola setting up the charity and explaining about Santa Stork.

Of course none of this was possible without the support we received from so many:

• All of our supporters who donated online, shopped from our Amazon wish list, or went out and bought a present using our suggested gifts. Your generosity is humbling – THANK YOU!
• All our wonderful referral sources who made a request and then who collected and distributed gifts
• Localgiving and their #GrowYourTenner match funding scheme. We raised an additional £580 which effectively meant new presents for an extra 50 children!
• Cllr Barbara Thomson for her Surrey County Council community grant which covered rental of the storage space we needed to run the project and the purchase of gift bags
• In Kind Direct and Disney Store UK for the 48 Olaf soft toys as part of the #GiftMagic campaign
• Andy Nash and the team at the Belfry  for helping at the giving day, including us to benefit from the Santa’s Grotto charity donations, providing gifts for Santa Stork and allowing us to promote the charity in the centre via wrapping days and being at the big Christmas light switch on with James and Ola!
• Celtic Contractors Ltd who got involved for the 4^thyear. All 40 staff purchased gifts in their now annual collection.
• Oakhyrst Grange School who collected toys at their school fair
• The parents at Holmesdale Community Infant School who collected stocking fillers
• Dunnottar School who raised over £300 to buy presents from our Amazon wishlist
• Our friends at Halliwell Marks, Walter & Mair, Pistachios Memorial Park, Redhill, TSB in The Belfry, and Let’s Explore, Horley who were so accommodating in allowing people to drop off presents at their premises
• The talented Shona Gow who produced the Santa Stork Activity Pack and Thank You Certificate available to all those who donated online or bought a gift, and our lovely Christmas card
• Caterham WI  who collected gifts and purchased stocking fillers with the proceeds of the raffle. They also provided volunteers for the wrapping weekend at The Belfry.
• Karl Hyder, AKA the man and a van! who helped bring the gifts from HQ to the wrapping location on the day
• Allianz Global Assistance UK – helped with wrapping gifts and staff raised £256.02
• Luxury beauty brand Jurlique who generously donated 300 products for mums with a value of £9660
• Redhill and Reigate Round Table no.119  who kindly made a donation of £500
• All Things Chic – proceeds from Red Barn shopping event raised enough to buy 20 items on our wish list
• Mila and Mateo who sold Halloween glowsticks after school raising £56 which we used to buy 180 packs of chocolate coins
• Milk + Poop who created a Black Friday shopping deal which meant we received a lovely box of brightly coloured cuddly toys and cellular blankets
• The ladies from Pfizer who helped sort presents on their volunteer day and who gathered their teams together at their offices in a campaign to generously donate selected age group’s gifts
• Bailhache Linton who made a donation in lieu of sending Christmas cards and helped out in the office during a CSR day
• Willis Towers Watson who came to sort through gifts during two CSR days
• Metro Bank – sorting gifts at CSR day
• IHS Markit, Coulsdon who helped prepare gift bags and who also collected lots of gifts and stocking fillers
• M&S Redhill who chose Stripey Stork as their annual charity and held an instore staff collection for Santa Stork 2017
• Horley Tangent who donated time at the wrapping days in The Belfry and held a shopping evening raising £700
• Corrine Yates and family who bought, raised money and collected so many items from Southern Housing
• That’s TV Surrey for featuring our story
• Horley Evening WI for their cheque for £160
• RBBC Town Hall who took delivery of all the Amazon parcels from the wish list and delivered them to us
• Bargains4Ever Redhill – contributing toys and allowing us to purchase items at cost price
• The Local Handyman for donating online and buying chocolate section boxes
• Emilia Hunt who donated some of her beautiful hand made fabric goods
• Redhill Confetti who donated craft packs for some of the children
• Esure who donated gifts and stocking fillers
• 3FEV who donated specific Tesla items for a young fanatic on our list!
• Tim’s Pastry Club who donated treats for the wrapping tables – yum!
• Nicola Churchill from Co-Tribe who held a collection and donated some gifts
• The communications team at Grant Thornton International who helped with campaign planning and with getting videos ready to share on our social media channels
• Tesco Community Champions who organised an in-store collection of gifts which was generously supported by Tesco Gatwick shoppers
• The team at the PNL Centre, St Joseph’s Church Hall for making us so welcome and for allowing us to use the hall as a discount rate
• And finally… our amazing Santa Stork team of volunteers – Jenny, Margarida, Nicola, Megan, Angie, Emma, Lisa, Andrea, Sarah C, Sarah S all ably led by Chief Elf Lauren.

Merry Christmas everyone xx

The post Santa Stork 2017 – our giving day appeared first on Stripey Stork.

This year it began in early September when we booked the hall for the wrapping day. Once we have the date and venue set we know that we are ready to go.

We launched the campaign to our referral sources and to all of you on 17^th October to coincide with the LocalGiving #GrowYourTenner campaign. This is a great opportunity to secure match finding and a way for us to have the purchasing power to secure discounts. We’ve been promoting Santa Stork in our emails and on social media since then until the cut off date at the start of December.

During this time, our referral sources submitted the requests for the families they’re working with.

• Requests for the family with multiple young siblings where the Mum felt she had to tell the older ones they wouldn’t be receiving any gifts this year
• Gifts for the school children whose support worker explained that without Santa Stork the children would probably only receive new socks for Christmas
• Items for the mums and children staying in the local Refuge this Christmas who arrived with just the clothes they were wearing

All of them in need and thoroughly deserving of a gift to make them smile this Christmas.

When we receive the specific requests (and we like them to tell us exactly what the children would like!), we enter an appropriate gift onto the Amazon wish list. The wish list has been very popular this year with support from people far and wide. In fact it emptied itself several times thanks to your generosity!

We also shared details of present requests with some of the local businesses who wanted to get involved.  Companies of all sizes from The Local Handyman, to Celtic Contractors to Pfizer, but who all share the common aim of wanting to support those most in need in their community this Christmas.

Families also got their children involved in choosing gifts and there were a number of local drop off points who kindly stored the gifts for us until we could collect.

A community coming together to help others as Christmas.

Once the gifts arrive, our volunteers have the fun task of matching them with the original request. A gift bag is then made up and not only does is contain the main present but also stocking fillers such as stationery, toiletries, small toys, books and chocolates. A really lovely selection of items that we’re proud to give out.

The bags are then all stored ready for Giving Day!

On the morning of Giving Day, with the help of several vehicles including ‘man with a van’ Karl Hyder, the presents are transferred to the hall. They are all lined up in code order and referral source, and our wonderful volunteers wrap them in batches according to pick up time.

Becoming Santa Stork Elves for the day, the volunteers are generally dressed in a festive theme, complete with elf toolkit (scissors, tape and pen) ready to get the job done!

The atmosphere is always great, with Christmas music on the radio and plenty of coffee and mince pies to keep everyone going.  We have visitors like the local newspaper and the Mayor, and everyone is always amazed at the scale of what we are able to achieve.

Once the referral sources start to arrive we handover the gifts complete with a folder which details exactly what presents are enclosed, and little extras like gift tags and even battery packs to make sure no playing time is wasted on the big day itself!

The referral sources then have the fun task of playing Santa and delivering the gifts directly to the families in plenty of time for Christmas Day.

Every year, Santa Stork becomes bigger and bigger, having a greater impact on families in need within our local community and we are so proud of what it achieves. We want to say an enormous thank you to all of you who help, by giving time, by donating gifts, donating online and who support us in our fundraising activities.

You are the reason we can do the things we do, and we appreciate you as part of #TeamStork.

We are really excited about Giving Day this year and we will be reporting on the event during the day. Be sure to follow us on social media on Wednesday 13th December and the days afterwards.

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