For the past 22 years, SPAR Hungary’s annual Joy to Give! charity campaign has made Christmas a little better for tens of thousands of families in need with the collection and donation of food packs. This year, the campaign organisers created a shopping list of items that people living in poverty would most benefit from. The list was 200 metres long and included several thousand items.

The six-day Joy to Give! donation campaign took place from 13-18 December in 133 SPAR and 32 INTERSPAR stores across the country, easily allowing customers to perform an act of kindness by donating food products purchased instore to the Hungarian Maltese Charity Service. From the products collected, gift packs will be personally delivered to those most in need in time for Christmas. Each gift pack is equivalent to a week’s worth of food donations provided by charity organisations and includes canned foods and other durable food products such as pasta, rice, flour, sugar and vegetable oil, as well as chocolate and biscuits.

“Last year, thanks to the help of our customers, we collected 309 tonnes of food, enabling us to prepare 34,000 gift packs. This year, we created the Country’s Shopping List, to ensure that the the most useful items were included in the packs. While any and all donations were warmly accepted, shoppers were encouraged to primarily select the items from the shopping list,” said Márk Maczelka, head of communications at SPAR Hungary.

The actual gigantic shopping list was on display at the participating SPAR stores as well as in the Budapest metro railway network and on other advertising platforms.

The list of participating stores and the value of the collected donations can be viewed here.

Source: SPAR Hungary

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About SPAR Hungary

The first SPAR Supermarket opened in Hungary in 1992, following the acquisition by ASPIAG (Austria SPAR International AG) of a majority stake in General Kereskedelmi Rt. Since its launch, SPAR Hungary has been actively involved in the development of the retail industry in the country.

The move to license independent retailers to operate the SPAR Brand has proven to be very successful for Hungary, with new stores meeting the needs of a larger number of shoppers. The retailers benefit from becoming part of the SPAR organisation with access to own brand products, operating systems and the brand, whilst consumers enjoy the increased number of store locations.