Santa’s big helper. A Truckee, CA, customer recently spent $15,000 granting kids’ holiday wishes through Operation Santa.
“I couldn’t think of a better thing to do than to answer a letter to Santa Claus,” said Ryan Wood, who “adopted” 35 letters, fulfilling the wishes of 150 children in need.
Wood assembled a group of volunteers to help him shop and write response letters to the children.
Many children wanted basic items like shoes and warm clothes, he said.
“All the kids got pretty much everything they asked for,” said Wood, who included coloring books for the younger kids and motivational journals for the older ones.
Sacramento District employees helped Wood ship his gifts using Priority Mail. The receipt was more than 7 feet long.
He plans to help again next year. “We can make it much bigger and with a bigger budget,” Wood said.
Take it back. With the holidays almost over, the Postal Bulletin’s latest edition looks ahead at how USPS is preparing to handle the inevitable flurry of gift returns. The Dec. 21 edition also previews upcoming stamp releases.
Got news for “Need to know”? Email your submissions to uspslink@usps.gov.
