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Operation Santa Report 2014

All you need is a miracle … The 2014 appeal has been the most successful ever, with a staggering 12,258 donations! That’s no

mean feat when the economic outlook is still fairly dire and people are struggling to make ends meet

and keep a roof over their heads, without supporting local charities. Compiling this year’s report

following another successful Operation Santa, I am struck by the fact that despite feeling the squeeze on

their finances, especially at this time of year, local people and businesses have still dug deep and we

have still managed to co-ordinate another successful toy appeal and reach more local children and

young people than ever!

I think the strength of our appeal, apart from the incredible people who’ve supported it, is that we are a

local appeal for local children in Dudley borough. Our ethos has always been to make a difference locally

and why support overseas aid, when there are children and young people living in poverty on our

doorstep!

To make it even easier to support us this year we put together a ‘wishlist’ of suggested gifts, including

items such as food and toiletries, to support our fellow charity ‘Black Country Foodbank’.

We launched our Operation Santa Appeal with a very special guest. Brett Harris from Blaze Hair, who’s a

huge supporter of Operation Santa, invited his

friend ‘Simon’, to help us launch the appeal and

here they are in the salon, along with the Blaze

Angels and another Brett from Bretts Barbers

Shops. ‘Simon’ said:

“Brett has been a fantastic supporter of the Dudley CVS

Operation Santa appeal for several years and each

year he surpasses himself with both the number and

quality of the toys and games he collects and donates

and which make a huge difference to thousands of

under-privileged kids in Dudley borough,” said ‘Simon,’

adding, “Brett and Dudley CVS get my vote, they

certainly have got the X-mas Factor.”

Social media keeps everyone updated As in previous years the Operation Santa blog was used to promote the Appeal and as the donations

climbed, daily updates were posted on the blog and more people started following the progress. In fact

we now have 1146 followers. We had 244 hits on one day alone and lots of comments and sharing via

Twitter, and our new Facebook page, which was a runaway success with 111 likes and lots of

conversations about how the appeal was progressing. I really feel this has helped to boost this year’s

appeal even further and lets people ask questions about what we do. Why not visit:

www.operationsanta.wordpress.com to read about our adventures this year and be ready to follow next

year’s appeal by signing up for updates? Or you can follow us on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/Operationsanta.Dudleyborough

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Businesses get involved

Yet again local businesses leapt in to support the appeal, many of them introduced to Operation Santa

by Brett from Blaze Hair.

Accord Steel Cladding

Paul Billingsley, a gym buddy of Brett’s and owner of a local

business, kick-started Operation Santa with a £250 donation for

the Pencil Case Appeal. Here he is top right, with Brett and the

Blaze Angels, who spent a hectic afternoon stuffing 100 pencil

cases ready for local kids. Paul was the winner of this year’s

Business Supporting the Community Award, for his charitable

contributions.

Paul also gave us £1000 towards Christmas parties, which was

shared out amongst 15 groups all across Dudley borough. Thanks Paul ☺

It wouldn’t be Operation Santa without Brett and the girls from

Blaze Hair Kingswinford. They adopted Operation Santa a couple

of years ago and Brett is a prolific collector of toys, gifts etc. from

clients, friends, family and anyone who’ll donate. He is on a

mission to reach as many disadvantaged local children as possible

and received our first Business Supporting the Community Award

in 2013. This year, by galvanising friends, family, colleagues,

customers and lots of local businesses, he was the catalyst to a

jaw-dropping 7647 toys, gifts and food items! The list of

businesses he encouraged to support us grew daily and included

SPAR, Morrison’s, Sainsbury’s, Gap, amongst others. Here are a

few photos of Brett on his marathon donation gathering journey!

Thomas from T Heath Light Haulage, who has also supported the

appeal for many years, sent us a cheque and then organised a quiz

night and swear box in the Portway Inn, Kingswinford, sending us a

second cheque to boost the appeal.

Sue & Geoff Hill supported us as always with a cash donation and

gathering donations at their shop in Amblecote.

Businesses who supported us last year got back in touch to support the appeal

too. Erik’s, Ice Blue and Mason’s Metals, very generously gave us donations

again and we are so grateful for their support and appreciate the fact that

they have chosen Operation Santa.

Here’s Paul MD of Ice Blue, dropping off a huge box of donations �

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Tim and Tina Pace who are local Kleeneze distributors, again approached us

to support the appeal and arrived at the office laden with boxes of new toys,

plus a cash donation. �

Nicklins supported us again this year as always, with a huge pile of donations

which helped to boost our total. We have a long history with Harvey from

Nicklins as he used to be Treasurer to the Hope Charity, who supported

Operation Santa for many years, fundraising each year to ensure that local

disadvantaged children and young people got gifts at Christmas.

ASDA Halesowen offered to support

us and Sam Warby, their Community

Colleague was sure we’d get lots of

donations and we certainly did.

Here’s a picture of us with the haul

of goodies that were donated by

both customers and staff. Wow, it

certainly helped to boost our

donations total. �

Staff at Avery Weigh-Tronix in Foundry Lane, Smethwick have

forgone the traditional Secret Santa present giving and receiving this

year, electing, instead, to donate over 300 gifts to the annual Dudley

CVS Operation Santa Toy Appeal. �

Eriks supported the appeal again, collecting toys and gifts to boost

the donations.

Who else supported us? I thought I’d share some of the stories we shared via social media about the people who supported us

below:

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Glynne Primary School - Pupils chose presents

they would like to receive themselves up to the

value of £15 and then immediately put the

present into the collection to be donated to

Operation Santa Toy Appeal. The idea to make

the donations came from ten-year-olds Will

Trinham and Isabelle Allport, who are Chair Boy

and Chair Girl on the pupil committee.

Will and Isabelle, together with fellow pupils,

Millie Groobey and Aimee Tuckley, helped deliver

the gifts to the Dudley CVS offices in Brierley Hill this week. Millie said, “We wanted to do

something for somebody who doesn’t have anything.”

Jim White and Dudley North Neighbourhood Watch –

supported us again this year, with lots of great donations for the

Pencil Case Appeal.

Challenge Network – young people from the Challenge Network

put on an event in Dudley Town Centre to raise awareness of

Operation Santa, Black Country Foodbank and the Creative Support

Christmas Party. Thanks to their enthusiasm they collected an

amazing 100 brand new donations for the appeal. �

Kingswinford Football Club – Simon, Carl and Mike

from the club raised funds at a big charity event to

purchase a pile of brand new toys from Smyths in

Kidderminster and the Manager Mark, gave them a

discount, so they could buy even more! �

Dudley MBC Staff – threw themselves into

supporting the Appeal yet again, with a collection point

set up at the Council House and collecting an amazing

number of gifts, food etc., amounting to 1206 items.

Local people also supported the appeal with

enthusiasm too, dropping donations of toys, books,

games and food into various collection points and the

Dudley CVS offices. Many of these support us every

single year!

Other supporters - the fabulous people, organisations and businesses who generously

supported this year’s Appeal are listed on our blog:

https://operationsanta.wordpress.com/supporters/

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££££££££

The finances swelled with donations from members of the public and the business community,

including:

Paul Billingsley from Accord Steel Cladding

Geoff and Sue Hill

T. Heath Light Haulage [two separate cheques]

Tim and Tina Pace from Kleeneze

Madeleine Cowley

Southdown Materials Testing

Hayley Group PLC

Plus donations from local people

We had some truly amazing items donated such as kids’ scooters and bikes, mountain bikes, X-boxes

with games, a Play Station and even a Nintendo DS.

Christmas Parties

Operation Santa wouldn’t be the same without Christmas Parties and these are a great way to make the

money donated go a long way. Thanks to the generous donation from Paul Billingsley and topped up

with other donations, we were able to fund an amazing 19 Christmas parties. That meant that over

700 local children and young people enjoyed a Christmas Party.

We’ve had some great thank you cards and photos and a few of these are below, as well as on the blog.

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Party Time at St Thomas’s Community Network Dudley!

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Final Figures

12258 Items of food, toys and gifts were donated.

7647 Of those were collected by Brett and his army of supporters.

2042 Were items such as food, toiletries etc for the Foodbank

648 Items were donated for our Pencil Case Appeal,

such as calculators, pencil cases, etc.

That’s an incredible 9568 toys, gifts, pyjamas, clothing etc. distributed

to children and young people from Operation Santa.

I think this can be counted as an unreserved success and hopefully it will be matched or better still,

exceeded in 2015.

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The difference it makes!

Let’s be honest though, Operation Santa isn’t about numbers, it’s about making a real difference to local

children and young people who would be expecting little or nothing under the tree on Christmas

morning. We had some emotional appeals from families in crisis through Social Services and other

channels. Thanks to the generosity of all our amazing supporters we were able to save Christmas for

these children.

There have been lots of stories on the blog to tell people about the children and young people

Operation Santa supports, but I just wanted to share a few with you. I’ve included feedback where I

have it.

We had a crisis call on the Monday

before Christmas for a family in

dire need who’d called into We

Love Carers for help.

There was money in the Operation Santa

pot, so Donna Roberts and I went

shopping to get presents for this and

another family.

As you can see from the photos we had

a great time shopping and lovely thank

you letter from the family.

We received a heartfelt thank you letter

from the family. �

This is what Operation Santa is all about

and it makes what we do so worthwhile!

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Recipients

Each year we are asked where the donated items go and the answer is quite simply to a child or young

person in need. We work with local voluntary, community, faith and statutory sector groups, who

support vulnerable and disadvantaged children, young people and families across the borough. The gifts

collected often help to make Christmas for them, when otherwise it’s likely they would receive nothing

or have little to celebrate.

Many of the groups we work with are out there providing support to families in crisis, who have

nowhere else to turn. It’s difficult to get feedback or allow people to meet the children and families that

Operation Santa supports, as in some cases there may be safeguarding concerns. Please rest assured

that whatever you have donated has gone to a child or family in need, who are eligible for support from

Operation Santa. For many of these children, your gift could be the only thing they get this Christmas!

3rd Brierley Hill Scouts

Albion Street Church

Black Country Foodbank

Brierley Hill Children's Centre

Brierley Hill Project

Bromley Children's Centre

Bromley Hills School

CHADD Christmas Party

Dudley Bliss

Dudley Foster Carers

Families x 38

Glynnie Tots Parents & Babies

Heaven's Kitchen

Holy Trinity Church Wordsley

Home Start

Hope Centre

Lapal Pre-School Playgroup

Manor Way Pre-School

Marbles

Mount Pleasant Methodist Church

Noah's Ark Toddler Group

Our Lady of Lourdes Moms & Toddlers Group

Roberts Primary - Family

St Thomas's Community Network

Stourbridge & Halesowen LIFE

Summerhill Community Centre

Sycamore Adventure

Top Church

Welcome Group

And others

Huge Thanks

Thank you to everyone who contributed to this year’s appeal and let’s hope this year’s is another

unqualified success, ensuring the Dudley HOPE legacy lives on.

Eileen Fielding

Volunteer Centre Development Officer [aka Santa’s not so little helper]

January 2015