Community in Action: Woodbridge Couple Turns One Donation Box Into a Toy Drive Reaching Hundreds
David and Scott Rudd have grown a small act of generosity into a countywide holiday tradition, partnering with local businesses, volunteers, and DCP&P to bring gifts to more than 200 children each year.
Volunteers gather in Edison to decorate more than 50 donation boxes used for the annual toy drive. (Credit: Team Rudd Foundation)
December 1, 2025
David and Scott Rudd are surrounded by wrapping paper—reds and blues, greens and golds, patterns of snowmen, snowflakes, and snow globes. They’re decorating cardboard boxes that will soon be filled with toys for children across Central Jersey. It’s hard to believe it all started with just one box.
With help from small businesses, local officials, and volunteers from the Kiwanis Club of Edison, the Woodbridge couple will gather hundreds of new, unwrapped toys this holiday season. Those toys will be delivered to New Jersey’s Division of Child Protection and Permanency (DCP&P) for children who might otherwise receive no presents for the holidays.
“I believe in Central Jersey,” said David, who grew up in Indiana.
Central Jersey’s mix of converging highways and cultures, along with the option of cosmopolitan and country living, gives the region a unique culture that David said reminds him of the Indianapolis area.
Later in life, David moved to Florida, where he met Scott. The two fell in love and decided to move together to Scott’s home state, New Jersey, where they could get married.
“He’s more Jersey than I am,” Scott added.
The couple married in 2013 and began exploring adoption through DCP&P. They were shocked to learn how many children were involved with the agency, and how few resources existed to serve them during the holidays.
Scott recalled asking a staffer how they provided Christmas gifts to so many children.
“They said, ‘We don’t have enough toys for all of the kids,’” Scott remembered.
More than 32,000 children were involved with DCP&P in 2023, according to the agency’s annual report. Nearly three-quarters were under age 13, and the same proportion were children of color.
The Rudds decided they wanted to help. David mentioned the need to his dentist, Dr. Regina Gumucio, who volunteered to place a toy donation box in her office at Advanced Dental of Woodbridge, located near the train station.
“I’ve been involved since Day One,” said Dr. Gumucio, whose Christian faith inspired her to participate. “It’s Christmas. It’s a time of giving and renewal. You’ve got to help people, especially the kids.”
The first donation box at Dr. Regina Gumucio’s dental office filled up quickly, prompting plans for additional boxes. (The Central Jerseyan)
Dr. Gumucio said her patients look forward to the toy drive every year. Some drop by to make donations even when they don’t have appointments. This year, the first donation box in her office is already full, and she expects her patients to fill at least two more.
That first year, the Rudds placed several boxes around town and, weeks later, drove the toys they collected to a local Department of Children and Families office.
Over the years, what started as a carload turned into truckloads, said Tiffany Banks, a DCF resource and development specialist in Middlesex County who has been the department’s point of contact for the Rudds.
“It just got bigger and bigger and bigger,” Banks said.
She recalled meeting the Rudds days after starting her job and being shocked by the sight of a moving truck filled to the ceiling with donations.
“I wasn’t expecting the amount,” Banks said. “I was so amazed that they took the time out of their lives to do this for children.”
Banks said the Rudds also connect her with other community members who provide services. When she mentioned that children needed haircuts, the Rudds connected her with a Woodbridge barber who volunteered to help.
This year, toys collected by the Rudds will go to more than 200 children—a conservative estimate, Banks said. The division receives so many toys that she’s able to save some for birthday gifts throughout the year.
“A child will come to my office and say, ‘Miss Tiffany, can I go to the magic closet?’ And I say, ‘Yes, you can,’” Banks said with a laugh.
Banks praised the generosity of her coworkers, who now tell her, “Let me know when the toys are coming, and I’ll be ready.” She credits the Rudds for inspiring that enthusiasm.
“You can see the energy in their eyes,” she said.
David and Scott Rudd, founders of the Team Rudd Foundation, are at their home in Woodbridge. (Credit: Team Rudd Foundation)
As the project grew, David and Scott organized the Team Rudd Foundation to formalize the effort, which begins each October. They meet with Kiwanis Club volunteers to coordinate donation sites across the region, including locations in Woodbridge, Metuchen, Highland Park, Edison, Piscataway, North Brunswick, Chatham, and Rahway.
“We really want to help enrich Woodbridge and Middlesex County as a whole,” David said. “We’ve been blessed.”
Once the list is finalized, the group gathers in Edison to decorate donation boxes. The room becomes a blur of activity: tape guns snapping, scissors slicing, paper rustling. Volunteers lean over tables, smoothing out snowflake prints while completed boxes pile to the ceiling.
The decorated boxes are dropped off at their locations and collected in mid-December. A local storage company donates the moving van.
The foundation continued even during the pandemic. When barred from gathering toy donations, the group raised funds for a local pet shelter instead. The Rudds have five dogs, and those who know them say there’s usually at least one pooch by their side.
After the pandemic, the couple used their experience to launch The Honey-Do Lister in 2022, a handyman service for small to medium jobs.
“Maybe you feel like you know how to change a faucet, but you don’t want to do it,” David said, adding that the company is fully bonded, licensed, and insured.
This year, the Team Rudd Foundation secured its first municipal partner. David and Scott, who live in Woodbridge, appeared at a town council meeting in September to make their pitch.
“I was a little nervous because I wasn’t sure how it would be perceived,” David said. “We’ve never tried to work with a municipality before.”
The Rudds and DCP&P staff unload truckloads of donated toys for children across Middlesex County. (Credit: Tiffany Banks)
Scott said he was equally nervous: “I don’t like leaving the house. [David’s] a former actor and a model, so I let him talk.”
Woodbridge Mayor John McCormac and council members pledged to help by providing toys left over from local toy drives.
“My heart soared,” David said.
Despite its size, the drive still reflects the personalities of the two men who started it. They joke with volunteers, hold ugly-sweater competitions with DCF caseworkers, and treat the foundation as a year-round mission, assisting dog rescues, foster programs, and organizing food and diaper drives.
To support the Team Rudd Foundation, contact David and Scott at [email protected] or drop off a new, unopened toy at any of the locations listed below.
Editor’s Note: The original article incorrectly stated that David Rudd grew up in Florida. He, in fact, grew up in Indiana.