Toy collections are coming to a close soon, but Hormel Foods Corp. employees were not going to miss out on the fun.

The Hormel Austin plant’s Helping Hands group purchased more than $6,000 worth of toys with an employee discount at Shopko and donated the toys on Friday afternoon to the Salvation Army’s Toy Shop drive.

“[Shopko’s] been very generous to allow us to do that,” Plant Manager Tim Fritz said.

Hormel employees raised more than $3,700 in their campaign, and the toys were purchased on Tuesday and Wednesday night. The team also presented Lt. David Amick with the Salvation Army a check for $150. 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.

“These are dedicated volunteers that help coordinate fundraising activities,” Fritz said.

This year the employees had a friendly competition to see who could raise the most money, and they ended up raising more than the previous year.

“It’s considerably higher than we did last year, so we’re excited about that,” Fritz said. “We take a lot of pride in this, as you can see. We enjoy it.”

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

“We appreciate Helping Hands,” he said. “This helps out tremendously.”

There are 824 children signed up for this year’s Toy Shop and Angel Tree drives. The toys will be distributed Friday and Saturday.