Hormel Foods Corp. employees were not going to miss a chance to donate toys to children in need this year, and Wednesday employees filled the Salvation Army truck with the results of this year’s annual drive.

The Hormel Austin plant’s Helping Hands group raised over $6,200 total to purchase toys for the Salvation Army’s Toy Shop drive. The group was able to purchase more than $11,000 worth of toys with an employee discount at Shopko, and donated the toys Wednesday morning at the Hormel Plant to the Salvation Army.

“This year they had fundraisers, bake sales and all kinds of activities that led to the purchase of all the toys,” Plant Manager Tim Fritz said.

Last year, the group raised about $3,800 to purchase toys. Fritz was excited about the extra money raised this year, and was very thankful to Shopko for the discounts which allowed for more toys to give.

“This year’s activity and generosity represents almost $2,500 more,” he said.

“There are people in our community and Mower County that are less fortunate, and hopefully this allows them to have a very merry Christmas,” he added.

The Salvation Army truck rolled up to the Hormel Plant and the group filled the back with toys.

The Hormel Helping Hands group started more than two years ago. The company had always done a donation drive of some sort, but many employees would be left out because they didn’t know about it. So a group got together and decided to get more organized.

Helping Hands member Rod Ryks thanked everyone involved for helping to purchase the toys and bring them out to the Salvation Army truck.

Salvation Army Lt. David Amick was also excited about the drive as it brought a considerable amount of toys in to help with the Toy Shop.

“We’re very happy, the generosity has been coming through just unbelievable this year,” Amick said. “Everyone’s been giving more and more this year, so we’re really happy we’re going to be able to help more kids this year.”

The toys will be distributed Thursday and Friday at the Salvation Army’s main building.