This holiday season, Princess Cruises Community Foundation (PCCF) sponsored its eighth annual employee holiday giving program benefitting Single Mothers Outreach, a local nonprofit organization that empowers single parents and their children by providing hope, support and resources so that families can become self-sustaining.

Princess Cruises employees based at the cruise line’s world headquarters in Santa Clarita, formed teams and sponsored a family using PCCF-purchased Target gift cards to buy clothes, toys and houseware items on each family’s wish list. Many employee teams supplemented the gift cards to purchase additional gifts which are delivered to approximately 100 area families in need.

“Over the last eight years, PCCF has donated $135,000 in holiday gifts to approximately 800 Single Mothers Outreach families, helping to make this holiday season extra special,” said Jan Swartz, Princess Cruises president and president of PCCF. “Each year, our employees look forward to helping this group of amazing single parents and always go to great lengths to make sure wish lists are fulfilled and gifts are beautifully wrapped.”

For this team-building program, a volunteer committee of Princess Cruises employees assigns teams to families and supplies a festive holiday gift-wrapping room where teams bring their purchased gifts to wrap and tag. Local moving company, Camelot Moving & Storage, donates moving trucks and employee time to load up the gifts to be delivered to Single Mothers Outreach. This year, Princess Cruises’ Captain Stanley the Bear, made a special appearance to help wrap last minute gifts and load the truck.

“We’ve been so fortunate and thankful each year to have the Princess Cruises Community Foundation and employees give to our families for the holidays,” said Yorleni Sapp, Single Mothers Outreach executive director. “This time of year, it’s oftentimes difficult to ask for assistance and this program makes it less stressful to help make the season brighter for their families.”

More information about Single Mothers Outreach can be found at www.singlemothersoutreach.org.

Princess Cruises Community Foundation, a nonprofit public benefit corporation, was established in 2008 to provide financial and in-kind support to non-profit organizations. The Foundation’s mission is touch the lives of the people in the places Princess Cruises travels, the places employees are from and the places they live through education, preservation of natural and historical global landmarks, responding to disaster relief and supporting global communities’ local health and welfare efforts.