COLUMN: Carillon Flashback Dec. 10, 2001 – Company tradition boosts Christmas hamper campaign

For the past six years, Steinbach groups have been getting together in a combined effort to ensure needy families in the Southeast get a little something extra at Christmas.

For the past four years, the employees at a group of Blumenort-based companies have been getting together at an annual Christmas party to add thousands of dollars to that Christmas hamper fund.

Last week, Community Christmas committee chairman Hank Klassen backed a half-ton up to Penner Farm Services at Blumenort to load the toys donated by employees of the Penner family’s five companies.

But the toys are only a small part of the annual contribution. Employees of Penner Farm Services, Southeast Forest Products, Penfor Construction, Nu West Products and W-4 Dairy again saw their donations of $2,500 tripled by their bosses.

What has become a Christmas tradition for the more than 100 employees working for the five companies began four years ago as a challenge from Penner Farm Services route salesman Ike Martens.

In 1998, Martens challenged his boss to double donations he collected from employees for the Southeast Food Bank’s annual hamper fund drive. Both Southeast Forest Products and Penner Farm Services equalled the employees’ contributions to add $7,746 to the fund that year.

This year’s efforts will bring the four-year total to more than $30,000.

Company president Reg Penner and controller Darrel Penner say they are proud of their staff, who respond so generously at the annual Christmas party and are pleased to double their contributions from the corporate side.

Klassen says it is this type of caring from Southeast businesses and their employees that help the committee meet its goal each year.

Klassen is fairly confident they will reach the $30,000 figure needed to fill the 2001 Christmas hamper list this year. Already, the toys portion of hampers has pretty well been covered, although more non-perishable food items and cash for turkeys are still needed, Klassen says.

Tins of vegetables or soups, or bags of sugar and flour, and pasta products dropped into any of the Community Christmas display bins around Steinbach will be most appreciated.

Klassen says a number of youth group volunteers will begin the arduous task of packing hampers this week at the Clearspring Centre.

Each year, it takes firefighters, ambulance personnel, Lions Club members and other volunteers just four hours to deliver the hampers all over the Southeast.

People scheduled to receive hampers are contacted to make sure they will be home and if they expect to be away, arrangements can be made to pick the hamper up at South East Helping Hands in Steinbach.