Santa’s helpers: How many volunteers does it take to pull off a Salvation Army Christmas?

It was just 19 hours until families would start arriving to pick up toys at the Salvation Army’s Christmas Center, and the 25 volunteers got their orders: Wade into the sea of white bags, peek inside them, and make sure each child has at least three toys.

Bags that didn’t have enough would need to be taken to “toyland” in the back of the former Kohl’s that’s serving as the Christmas Center this year to get more goodies dropped in.

For the next three hours, these volunteers, some from companies including Microsoft and Wells Fargo, joined the ranks of the more than 2,330 area residents who donated their time this season to help families in need have gifts at Christmas.

More than 6,540 children are registered to receive toys and clothes through the Salvation Army’s Angel Tree program, which matches children in need with anonymous donors who buy the gifts. Some 1,547 senior citizens will also receive gifts this Christmas.

In cases where donors don’t step up, Charlotte Observer readers cover the expense by giving to the Empty Stocking Fund. Money raised by last year’s Empty Stocking Fund allowed the Salvation Army to purchase 11,541 toys and 590 gifts for low-income seniors, in addition to 925 gift cards.

This year, those approximately 2,330 volunteers will have worked more than 7,500 hours registering families, manning Angel Tree tables, collecting gifts, filling bags in the Christmas center and helping distribute gifts to families.

Some take vacation days from work to help. Others schedule a morning or afternoon shift with co-workers as a team-building experience.

Terri Briggs has been volunteering at the Christmas Center for at least a dozen years, but four years ago she really upped her efforts: she now has a tradition of taking two weeks of vacation from work to help at the Christmas Center.

Earlier this week, she was checking and filling bags and helping with distribution once parents started coming in to pick up gifts.

“I go home exhausted but so fulfilled, seeing the community support for this. And for me as a parent, I couldn’t imagine not being able to provide for my kids in that situation, and then having to ask for that help,” Briggs said. “I think it takes a strong individual to do that.

“This is such a huge undertaking, and for me to be just a small part of that, is very gratifying,” she said.

Work teams pitch in

Teams of volunteers from companies big and small make up a big part of the Salvation Army’s holiday volunteer workforce.

This year, 196 groups from local companies signed up to work volunteer shifts. And some 110 companies that sign up to “adopt” angels for their Angel Tree. (Each child who is registered to receive Christmas gifts is assigned an angel card with a wish list that a donor fulfills.)

Maiva Lee, who came with a team from Wells Fargo, said she makes a special point to spend time at the Christmas Center each year.

Lee was just 3 years old when her family immigrated to the United States from Thailand, and during her first Christmas in the U.S., her family’s refugee sponsor signed her and her two siblings up to receive gifts from the Salvation Army.

“I come here every single year,” Lee said. “It’s my way of paying it forward.”

Grateful for support

The Salvation Army has just five full-time employees who oversee the Christmas program, and one is volunteer coordinator Velegar Curry, who has her own close connection with the program.

When Curry was a little girl growing up in Minneapolis, her family relied on the Salvation Army’s Christmas program so that she could have toys for Christmas. When she moved to Charlotte, she started volunteering with the Christmas program, and this fall she hung up her stay-at-home-mom hat temporarily to work for the Salvation Army during the Christmas season.

“I was thinking about things that made an impact growing up,” she said.

She said she’s been delighted by the volunteers she’s met: ones, like Briggs, who take off work to help, and others like a college student at nearby UNC Charlotte who wandered in one morning last week, signed up to volunteer, and has come every morning since.

Brent Rinehart, director of communications for the Salvation Army of Greater Charlotte, said volunteers are critical to the charity’s Christmas efforts, which are one of the biggest in the city.

“Without the support of volunteers, we wouldn’t be able to pull it off,” he said. “We’re incredibly grateful to have such great support from the community.”

How to donate

To donate to the Empty Stocking Fund online: EmptyStockingFundCLT.org.

To donate by mail, send checks to: The Salvation Army of Greater Charlotte, P.O. Box 31128, Charlotte, NC 28231. Make checks payable to The Salvation Army of Greater Charlotte and write “Empty Stocking Fund” in the memo line.

Questions concerning your donation? Call 704-716-2769.

We’ll publish all donors’ names.