More than 18,000 children will wake up to gifts after appeal

More than 18,000 children affected by hardship will wake up to gifts this Christmas thanks to a generous Glasgow appeal.

Glasgow’s Spirit of Christmas is a 37,000-strong Facebook group of members, supporters and volunteers all with one goal – to make sure no child is left without a present on December 25.

“The charity is about bringing the magic of Christmas, protecting that for children no matter what their circumstances are,” says founder Julie Griffin.

She told STV News: “Not every child we help is living in poverty.

“Some children are referred to us because there might be an illness in the family, perhaps themselves, a sibling or a parent.

“They might even live in a very affluent area but the family might be in trouble, parents recently becoming unable to work, perhaps having to depend on other charities and organisations to help pay their mortgage, pay their bills, they might need to use all their savings.

“We get all sorts of different of children referred to us for different reasons.”

The charity received donations worth more than £1m this year.

The group officially launched its seventh year running on October 1 to help children suffering hardship in Glasgow and the surrounding areas.

Since 2014, more than 60,000 children have been supported by their campaign – with presents worth more than £2m being donated in total.

The process is rather unique compared to other gift campaigns as it ensures each present is suitable for each child in need by creating an online portal of referred cases.

‘It is a lot more personal than a lot of appeals. You know the gender and the age group of that child so already you have an idea how you can help.’
Julie Griffin

Volunteers can choose a specific age and gender so that each donated present is more suitable for each child.

Julie said: “It is so much more than a monetary donation, you are being allocated a person to buy gifts for.

“It is a lot more personal than a lot of appeals. You know the gender and the age group of that child so already you have an idea how you can help.

“This is a human being, this is not a number, this is not thinking I hope these donated toys end up somewhere suitable – you are selecting a present for a specific child.

“We work with all our partners to make sure these are real referred children.

‘This is a human being, this is not a number, this is not thinking I hope these donated toys end up somewhere – you are selecting a present for a specific child.’
Julie Griffin

“The staff are working closely with them so when somebody chooses a child from our Christmas portal, they know their age and gender.

“Then they can think ‘what would this child or young person like to wake up to on Christmas morning? How can I make their day a little bit more magical?’.”

Depsite 2020 being such a successful year for the children’s gift campaign, Julie said the group faced a great deal of obstacles due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Julie told STV News: “This year we didn’t know how we were going to do it.

The team powered through despite the pandemic slowing the process down.

“There were so many challenges and obstacles around the whole campaign due to the pandemic.

“We didn’t have all the answers but we decided to take a leap of faith.

“We didn’t know how we were going to do it – we just knew that we were.”

Julie and her team were forced to work double the amount of time due to coronavirus safety measures.

She said: “We had to go through health and safety checks due to Covid.

The appeal has helped more than 60,000 children since 2014.

“We had to scale down what we could do each day as only so many of us were allowed on the one floor at the one time.

“It meant that everything we did took so much longer.

“Instead of working and stopping at 6pm, some of us were working right up until midnight just to make sure we got the same amount of work done as other years.

‘It’s such an amazing campaign to be a part of and it is all about these gifts made with love.’
Julie Griffin

“We got there in the end and it’s fantastic.”

Over the past few days the mountains of donated gifts have been registered and sorted by volunteers where they will be allocated to each charity.

From there the presents will be gifted to the specific child to open on Christmas morning.

Julie said: “We feel very appreciative of everybody’s support because this relies on so many volunteers, so many supporters, so many members all just giving for giving’s sake.

“Nobody is getting anything in return apart from this incredible feeling of joy.

“It’s such an amazing campaign to be a part of and it is all about these gifts made with love.”