Christmas Parcels for Children's Homes

Project: Christmas parcels for children from family-type children's homes (RDD) and care and educational facilities.

Location: all of Poland; over one hundred facilities across the country.

Client: Reequest Events for ORLEN S.A. / ORLEN Foundation.

My scope of responsibility: concept for selecting gifts by age group and gender, purchase and assembly of the parcels, selection and purchase of gifts for parents and caregivers, selection and purchase of family vouchers, personalization of the parcels, oversight of the creation of graphic materials (Christmas card, labels, stickers), organization of the warehouse and packing process, coordination of shipping in cooperation with ORLEN Paczka, organization and coordination of Santa Claus visits at selected facilities, production of a Christmas film (casting, film crew, post-production, legal handling of image rights), coordination of subcontractors, and operational supervision.

Context and challenge

The ORLEN Foundation has been running its initiative of delivering Christmas parcels to children from family-type children's homes and care and educational facilities for two decades. This is not a one-off gesture but a tradition, and with each edition the expectations grow. The jubilee, twentieth edition meant a scale that is not visible from the outside: over a thousand children, more than one hundred facilities scattered across Poland, several age groups, each requiring a different set of gifts, and zero margin for logistical error, because the parcels have to arrive before Christmas.

The challenge had three dimensions at once. The first was curatorial: how to choose gifts that hit the mark rather than feel random. The second was operational: how to efficiently assemble, pack and send hundreds of parcels to recipients dispersed across the country. The third was about image: how to present the entire initiative not as a corporate message, but as a real, human story.

Creative concept

We rejected the idea of the parcel as a collective gesture. Instead of one averaged set, we designed over a dozen separate gift sets, each matched to the age and gender of the specific child. Infants received sensory toys and high-contrast books. Children up to three years old got wooden push toys, building blocks and interactive mats. Older, school-age children received educational sets: microscopes, chemistry kits, board games, encyclopedias. Teenagers got gift cards for Empik and Media Markt, so they could choose what they really wanted.

A separate, carefully considered chapter was the gifts for parents and caregivers. We deliberately moved away from a symbolic trinket and instead proposed handmade, decorated glass baubles. It was a deliberate choice: something lasting, of Polish craftsmanship and real value, as an expression of respect for the adults who build a home for these children every day. Added to this was a family game as a pretext for spending time together. For whole families we also prepared cinema and theater vouchers, a gift that does not stay in a drawer but becomes a shared experience. Every parcel carried a sticker with the child's name, a detail that turns a logistics operation into something personal.

Production and logistics

Key elements of delivery:

- Purchase and assembly of over a dozen separate gift sets according to an age and gender matrix: educational and sensory toys, board games, science kits, and gift cards for teenagers and for adult beneficiaries with intellectual disabilities;

- Purchase of handmade porcelain baubles for parents and caregivers, and of family games;

- Purchase of cinema and theater vouchers as a shared gift for the whole family;

- Rental of warehouse space for receiving goods, sorting, assembling and packing the parcels;

- A multi-day, organized packing process with a team of several people;

- Eco-friendly recycled packaging, paper filler, personalized stickers with the children's names, and Christmas stickers on the bulk cartons;

- Graphic design: Christmas card, labels and shipping materials, consistent with the initiative's identity.

Coordination of shipping to over one hundred facilities across Poland in cooperation with ORLEN Paczka.

Santa visits and film production

At the heart of the initiative, alongside the Christmas parcels, was our presence in the field. At selected facilities we organized visits by Santa Claus and the Snow Maiden, with Christmas decorations, a story, carol singing together and handing out gifts in person. The program of each visit was structured: a welcome, Santa's entrance, a short Christmas story, time for carols, photos and a farewell. Yet at every facility it came alive anew, because the children were different, the caregivers were different and the atmosphere was different.

The visits were recorded by a professional film crew working on 4K equipment, with a gimbal and two cameras at once. Post-production resulted in two pieces: a short clip for social media and a longer report on the whole initiative, with a music track, subtitles, and statements from children and caregivers. We handled the formal side of the children's image rights, necessary for filming at the facilities, in-house, with the help of a law firm.

Coordination and delivery

The project involved several weeks of intensive work: from choosing and ordering the gifts, through organizing the warehouse and packing process, to coordinating visits at geographically dispersed facilities and producing film materials from four locations in the Lodz region. Delivery closed on schedule, and the parcels reached the beneficiaries before Christmas. The client rated the initiative as professionally executed, with attention to detail and a quick response to changing circumstances. Twenty editions in a row, and not one looks like routine.