Bright Holidays - A Jacksonville, Florida Charity for Underprivileged Students and Families

Bring Joy by Providing Necessities to Students

Bright Holidays, a recognized public charity, was founded to help underprivileged students and families in the greater Jacksonville, FL area during the holiday season. Bright Holidays operates on a seasonal basis, relying solely on volunteers and operates with no fixed expenses. More than 99% of donations go directly to benefit disadvantaged children and families. Continue reading...

Bright Holidays Helps Children in Need

Deanna Fene of First Coast News dropped by the Bright Holidays warehouse to see how we were helping more than 800 children last holiday season. View the First Coast News video or read the article.

As Needs Have Grown, So Has Our Outreach

Working with school principals to identify those in need of clothing, food, school supplies and other necessities, Bright Holidays expanded its outreach to fund lunch accounts for hungry school children who had no other source of lunch money. As a result, we created the Bright School Days program, which continues our mission throughout the school year by helping supplement the lunch accounts of children who would otherwise go without.

David Garrard Teams Up with Bright Holidays for 2011 Campaign

Last season, David Garrard served as Honorary Chair of the Bright Holidays fundraising campaign, teaming up with us to help underprivileged kids for the fifth year. Learn more about David Garrard's role »»

Highlights

• In 2010, Bright Holidays provided necessities to nearly 800 children in need, by working with 27 Jacksonville-area schools.
• Despite a troubled economy, total donations in 2010 exceeded $80,000, an increase of 24% over 2009 totals.
• 50% of 2009 donors contributed again in 2010 with 69% maintaining or increasing their level of participation
• Of the money spent on gifts, 97% went for essential items such as food, clothing and school supplies; 2% was used for simple gifts such as art supplies, games and balls.
• Operating expenses for last year totaled $800, just less than 1% of monies received.
• Area businesses including Baptist Medical Center, Burdette Ketchum, Frances King Insurance Agency, On Ideas, NAIOP, the Neviaser Foundation, Publix Charities, Sawgrass Asset Management and the South Council of the Jacksonville Chamber of Commerce contributed to our mission through gifts of time and treasure.
• More than 250 volunteers handled the shopping, sorting, wrapping and delivery of gifts.

Bright Holidays on Facebook

If you are a Facebook user, please invite your friends to join Bright Holidays' Facebook Cause. This is a great way to spread the word about Bright Holidays.