SM CITY Cagayan de Oro formally kicked-off its celebration of the Christmas season with the unveiling of its Christmas centerpiece and the launching of its annual charity project: Bears of Joy on Saturday, November 10.
With its theme: Winter Magic, the event is for Kagay-anons to experience what it feels like to celebrate winter Christmas, according to Assistant Vice President for Marketing in Mindanao Russel Alaba.
"This is the first time that a theme like this is done here in uptown. Its also very fitting because for the whole Mindanao, all supermalls in Mindanao, the theme is also winter. Because we wanted to give people an experience na you know just a little taste naman lang ng winter," Alaba said.
Alaba also shared the story behind the centerpiece, which is a huge white reindeer in the middle of a forest covered in snow and gifts.
"The centerpiece is actually revolving around... we have like a mythical deer that's supposed to come out of a magical forest. Its also like a reminiscent of one of Santa's deers that sort of like broke away... like he kinda wander around the forest and got lost and found its way here, uptown, with all the gifts that he brought with him," Alaba said.
SM, as part of their tradition, also invited their partners in the community, particularly the kids from the P.N. Roa Elementary School for the gift giving.
Part of the event is also the launching of SM's charity project: Bears of Joy, in which a customer can buy a pair of toy bears for P200, wherein one of the bears goes to the customer and the other is left to be given to their chosen charity.
"The Bears of Joy is an annual drive wherein we share the bears to kids who are less fortunate and we also encourage our shoppers as well to give," Alaba said.
"It’s also a way of encouraging our shoppers to share their blessings," he added.
Apart from the executives of SM Supermalls, also present during the event were City Mayor Oscar Moreno and City Investments and Promotions officer Eileen San Juan.