It’s been two years since the inception of the Toasty Toes campaign and it has already made a significant difference towards warming the feet of the local homeless community.
This year, the campaign collected 7,143 pairs of socks.
“So if you combine the two years, we’re just shy of 15,000 pairs of socks over two years which is incredible,” said campaign organizer Allison Mitchell.
“It went really really well.”
The campaign had 52 collections around the city which included public drop-off locations, schools, local businesses and groups for socks to be collected from Oct. 10 to Nov. 10.
The socks were then distributed to 12 different organizations last week that included Chalmers Community Services Centre, Dunara Homes for Recovery, The Drop-In Centre, Guelph-Wellington Women in Crisis, Guelph Food Bank, John Howard Society (Guelph), Lakeside HOPE House, Michael House, Parkwood Gardens Neighborhood Group, Sanguen Health Community Van, West Willow Village Neighbourhood Group and Wyndham House.
She said last year, she expected to collect a few hundred pairs of socks, but ended up collecting 7,700.
“I don’t try to go in with too many expectations because its a fairly new campaign,” said Mitchell.
This year, the number of socks collected superseded her expectations once again.
She said offering a high number of public drop-off locations is crucial because if the public is taking the time to donate, then she wants to make sure there are convenient options available for them to do so.
“It was pretty incredible to see how the community really came together and provided socks," said Mitchell.
Last year, Mitchell used her house to store and count boxes of socks as family members helped.
“Lakeside HOPE House was really generous and they donated the space for us to be able to receive the sock donation in their gym,” said Mitchell about this year’s campaign.
“I had some volunteers come in and help me with sorting, counting and boxing all of the socks to get them ready to go to the organization,” said Mitchell adding that having that space to accommodate volunteers was of enormous help.
“I think the Toasty Toes campaign each year is a learning process so I learned some tips to help me for the next year,” said Mitchell.
"At the end of the day, I want to collect as many socks as possible so it helps those who are experiencing homelessness or are at risk of experiencing homelessness in Guelph because the weather has now turned cold and having socks that have holes or not having socks at all is just not something that somebody should have to live with."
