Wrap Party - City Santa

GUIDE TO A WRAP PARTY

Wrap party?

We have it down to a science.

A wrap party is when people come together to wrap gifts. It can be any size gathering, from a few friends in a living room to a large gathering of volunteers at a school gymnasium.

City Santa started when my husband and I went to the New York City post office and picked up letter’s children wrote to Santa. We never thought in a million years it would ever be more than our thing. When friends asked to join us, we began to hold annual wrap parties. City Santa grew to serving more than 1200 people a year. Many of the same volunteers came year after year and for some, our wrap parties became a holiday tradition.

The key? Make it effortless to volunteer. A great party includes organization, plainly marked signs, supplies in abundance, clear direction, donuts, pizza, and lots of rockin’ holiday music. Here are some tips to how we did it.

Organization

• Gather supplies: scissors, tape, bows, nametags, pens and markers– have plenty on hand and easily accessible.

• Set up wrapping paper, tissue, and boxes in one place.

• Pre-cut the wrapping paper by size (reduces waste) and clearly indicate which size box that paper is for.

• Mark which size box, bag, or container a gift should be wrapped in. This will cut the number of misused boxes.

• Create samples of gift baskets or stockings for volunteers to reference to ensure consistency.

Refreshments

• Water and lots of it. Have labels and markers available at the water table for volunteers to ID their bottles.

• Coffee and donuts go a long way to getting the morning started off on the right foot.

• Pizza and soda for lunch always make the volunteers feel appreciated.

Wrapping

• Kids love to open boxes! Wrap the big things separately i.e., coat in one box, sweater with socks in another. So much more fun than one big box with everything in it.

• Always remember a gift tag.

• Tape a candy cane to the top of the box for extra cheer!

Crank up the music! No speaker available? Put a phone in a metal bucket, that will do the trick!

What can you do?

A little bit goes a long way.

The number one request in a shelter is socks. Putting few socks in a gift bag or a stocking with some personal care items such as toothpaste, toothbrush and a bar of soap topped with piece of candy can brighten someone’s holiday.

Keeping everyone’s gift straight

Sometimes volunteers like to take care of a whole family and will get a list of their needs. Below are tips to keeping everyone’s gift straight.

• Ensure clothing goes to the right recipient. Write the name on the price tag while still in the store. (We found that no matter how many times we said, “Oh I will remember who that goes to,” we rarely did. It caused us to backtrack—no need for that stress!)

• If you are purchasing for more than one family, bag a family together and write their name on the outside of the shopping bag.

• Don’t forget the pets! Kids love it when there is a little something for their pets.