Daily News
From Home Furnishing Business
Secret Santa Came to Idaho with Gifts to People in Need
December 27,
2024 by Karen Parrish in Business Strategy, Industry 
Every year, East Idaho News.com helps a native eastern Idahoan to give out gifts to people in Idaho who need a gift from Santa. These people are nominated by friends or family who recognize a need in their community/family and send a letter to "Santa" to let him know why their nominee needs and deserves a "visit" from Santa.
The Secret Santa is a native Idahoan who lives in eastern Idaho. The money comes directly from him – not a program, organization, charity or trust fund.
According to the article on eastidahonews.com, Secret Santa and EastIdahoNews.com have been surprising people in need since 2015. That year, Secret Santa gave away $100,000. The amount has increased every year and over $4.6 million has been gifted.
Since 2015, the Secret Santa has asked East Idaho News to help him find and vet potential recipients and be his conduit for delivering the gifts.
Why does he do it?
One Christmas, when Secret Santa was a young man living temporarily in a foreign country, he was not expecting any gifts. But on Christmas morning, when he sat down for breakfast, he received a gift.
It was the only Christmas gift he received that year. It was anonymous and it had a big impact on him, and to him this gift meant that someone loved and cared about him. That lifted him up beyond what anyone could have imagined.
Today, there are countless people around him who love him, and he wants others to know that there are people who love them and care about them. He believes that giving anonymously with no expectation of receiving anything in return is the ultimate expression of love and caring.
One off the recipients of Santa's generosity this year was a very deserving Mom who received $1,000 in gas gift cards to help her get to her medical appointments, $2,000 in grocery store gift cards to help her and her teenage son get the food they need, and $5,000 from Ashley Furniture HomeStore to provide furniture for her home.
Ashley will provide the furniture, delivery and set-up of the furniture for the woman whose current belongings consist of lawn furniture in her living room. Some quality furniture will definitely be put to good use.
It seems as though this Secret Santa got his letter for this woman at just the right time.
Secret Santa does not ask for donations. He gives these gifts because he wants others to have the experience he had decades ago. This Secret Santa encourages others to find someone in their community who needs help and bless them – then pay attention to how that brightens your day. His message to the world: Everyone can be a Secret Santa!
This article appeared on eastidahonews.com.