It’s nearly Christmas which means that most people are rushing around buying gifts for their loved ones, or drawing names in Secret Santas, but for some this isn’t the case anymore. With the increasing costs, there are now a large amount of people who can’t afford to look at Christmas as the season of giving, and sadly may not be receiving or giving gifts on Christmas Day.

In response to this, comes about the introduction of Giving Trees, an opportunity for others to purchase gifts for those people in need and to ensure that no-one goes without a gift at Christmas. Over recent years, it’s more and more likely that you’ll have seen a “Giving Tree” whilst doing your own Christmas shopping, so next time why not take part in one of these initiatives? Here are a couple of the initiatives that we’ve seen!

CONNECT READING

One of the examples of a local campaign is The Giving Tree run by small charity, Connect Reading. Connect Reading work with local charities to understand the specific gifts requested by people in need which the general public and local businesses are then able to directly purchase.

All gifts that are donated to the Giving Tree, are specific, requested gifts that people actually want, eliminating the concern of buying an unwanted, or unusable gift.

Connect Reading work with local shopping centre, The Oracle as the main place to take part in the campaign, and the general public are able to take a tag from the tree, purchase the gift and return it to The Oracle in time for Christmas.

This year, Connect Reading is working to provide just over 1500 gifts, valuing at £22k to support 19 charities this year, with the help from 14 donor organisations, and of course, the general public.

DUNELM GIVING TREE

Want to take part but not Reading based? Dunelm also run their own initiative, called “Delivering Joy.” Similarly to the Connect Reading initiative, you can take a tag from a tree (from any Dunelm store) and it will tell you who your gift is for and what the gift requested is. You’ll then be able to purchase the gift and return it in time to be given to people in need for Christmas!

In addition to the Delivering Joy trees, Dunelm are also partnering directly with Age UK, where you can donate the value of a gift online and you’ll be directly helping older people this Christmas.

KIDS DAY OUT TREE

Perhaps you’re looking for an initiative that exclusively supports children at Christmas? Kids Day Out works directly with businesses to swap the traditional work Secret Santa for a tag from The Giving Tree which highlights what toy the child would like for Christmas.

You can then virtually buy the gift via the QR code, all from the comfort of your own home!
Alternatively, if you’d like to buy the gift physically, you can buy and drop off to your nearest collection point.

If you’re looking to get involved in something good this Christmas, why not take part in one of these fantastic initiatives, or even see if there’s another local Giving Tree near you!

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