CALGARY -- Toy Mountain made it to the summit Wednesday, smashing its goal by collecting $1 million in toys and basic essentials.
The campaign, which CTV Calgary launched in conjunction with CJAY 92, 98.5 VIRGIN Radio and Funny 1060AM, collected toys, cash donations and other much-needed items that will be collected in support of the Calgary Women's Emergency Shelter.
When the numbers were finally crunched Wednesday, they were pretty inspiring considering the campaign took place during the pandemic.
"Putting this together this year was a bit of a challenge," said CTV Marketing and Promotion Director Jason Almeida, in an email. "But we pushed through with drop-off locations and new innovative ideas (touchless donation option on our website).
"We even kept our goal at $350,000 in toys and basic essentials, a big goal that we expected to just barely pass." Instead, the campaign raised a total of 24,422 toys and basic essentials, which had a value (including financial donations), of $998,137."
Hearing that news, an anonymous viewer of CTV News made a donation of $1,863 directly to the Calgary Women’s Emergency Shelter… lifting the total to the $1 million mark in toys, essentials and financial donations.
"Calgary did what Calgary does best," Almeida said. "And truly proved that despite the conditions, wanted to help those in need."
The Calgary Women's Emergency Shelter is focused on ending family violence and abuse in the lives of women, children and men.
