Stuff-A-Fire-Truck toy drive helps more families this year

Firefighters and community volunteers gathered at Amherstburg Fire Station #1 to sort and pack boxes of toys as part of the “Stuff-A-Fire-Truck” toy drive.

The Amherstburg Firefighters’ Association held its annual “Stuff-A-Fire-Truck” toy drive and it concluded over the weekend.

Members of the association collected the new, unwrapped toys and pajamas from participating businesses last Friday and spent Saturday morning at Amherstburg fire station #1 packing the boxes. Families that had registered came to the fire hall last Sunday to pick up their boxes.

Participating businesses are Canadian Tire, Movati Athletic, Joe Meloche Ford, Caffeine & Co., Heritage Tire, Home Hardware, Shooters Roadhouse, Hotel STRY, Precision Jewellers, Richmond Popcorn Co., Petras Dental, Corner Stop Variety and Mercato Fresh. People could also drop off toys and/or pajamas at town hall or any of the fire stations.

“We’ve got 91 families and 246 children this year,” said Amherstburg Firefighters’ Association (AFA) vice president Cameron Arksey. “That’s more than last year.”

Arksey said the 91 families in 2025 was an increase of 18 families over 2024.

“The need is growing,” said Arksey. “The number of applications are growing.”

Donations every year are always needed and appreciated, said Arksey.

Arksey said they didn’t work with the Big Toy Dump this year and everything was raised in-house by the local firefighters. He said there was a lot of local support within Amherstburg this year.

There were over 25 volunteers helping pack the boxes at fire station #1 last Saturday morning, between fire department members, their families and volunteers from within the community. 

“It’s a good mix of families, firefighters and the community helping out,” said Arksey. “We really appreciate them helping out.”

Firefighters doing toy drives in Amherstburg date back to when it was part of the AAM Goodfellows campaign. The toy drive broke away from the Goodfellows numerous years ago and the AFA has been doing it as a standalone campaign.n years.

Stuff-A-Fire-Truck toy drive helps more families this year

By Ron Giofu