Aviva and the Gift Wishing Tree
Co-ordinating Christmas Collections is an essential part of the run up to Christmas at York Cares. This year, when we went out to our community partners and asked them to complete a form outlining what the people they work with need this Christmas, their responses demonstrated that the need is greater than ever with over 6,000 items being requested.
We asked our members for their help collecting donations within their organisations and this morning, when we went to Aviva, we were blown away by the number of donations waiting for us. Last week, Debbie Bullock, Head of DEI and Wellbeing Lead at Aviva tagged us in a post showing a Gift Wishing tree with over 200 tags on it. Each tag had an item from the wishlist and employees were encouraged to take a tag and then bring back the item to donate to the Christmas Collection.
Just one week later, there were only 25 of the 200 tags remaining and over 60 items have already been donated. Even more amazingly, Aviva’s support doesn’t stop there and they have asked for more items to add to tags.
We are blown away by the support from Aviva and our other members who, despite it being a challenging time, are pulling together and helping us to make the festive period a little better for vulnerable and isolated people in York. Slowly but surely, the York Cares office is filling up with items from the wishlist and although before long we might need to make tunnels to reach our desks, we couldn’t be more grateful for the support.
To everyone who is helping us to reach this year’s extremely large target of 6,003 items, thank you from the bottom of our hearts.
How can you help?
We are looking for organisations who can support this year’s Christmas Collections through donating much needed items from the wishlists, who can provide collection points for donations, and who can encourage colleagues to get involved.
To get involved, view the Christmas Wishlist 2023. If you cannot access Google Sheets, please contact Ebba who can send the information across in an alternative format.
For more information please contact Ebba at info@yorkcares.co.uk
