Secret Santa shopping in our Charity Shops

As Christmas and the festive season approaches, one tradition that continues to grow in popularity is Secret Santa shopping. Secret Santa shopping encourages thoughtful giving without the pressure of buying expensive gifts. It focuses on creativity, fun and kindness rather than new, expensive presents.

What is Secret Santa Shopping and how does it work?

A family, friendship group or a work team agree to participate in Secret Santa Shopping
An affordable gift spend limit is agreed (maybe £10 or £15)
The group follows one of these methods:

- Each person is randomly assigned someone to buy a gift for, often by picking a name out of a hat.
- Gifts are bought without knowing who will receive them. Each gift is wrapped to hide its contents and then randomly selected on the chosen day.

Photo of Santa and Mrs Clause with some of our Winter Market volunteers in December 2025

Once gifts have been opened, participants often try to guess which person bought the gift they received. 🙂

Secret Santa shopping in Hillingdon

Secret Santa shopping often comes with the instruction that ‘gifts must be purchased from a charity shop’. This helps support local charities whilst increasing the dimensions of fun, creativity and thoughtful thinking.

Every item purchased from one of our charity shops helps provide 24 hour care 365 days a year within our inpatient unit, Michael Sobell House.

It also helps to fund our home care services, bereavement services and many other care services across Hillingdon.

Find and visit one of our Charity Shops 🎅👇

Maps where you can find out charity shops can be viewed below.