Tyler Perry Pays $434K In Layaway Items For Walmart Customers

Source: Taylor Hill / Getty

The Coins Were Delivert

Tyler Perry is making all the Christmas dreams come true thanks to a generous donation to Walmart customers.

According to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Mr. Perry paid for people’s layaway items at the Walmart on 844 Cleveland Avenue in East Point, Georgia and the store at 70001 Concourse Parkway in Douglasville, Georgia. His payments totaled about $434,000.

Praise baby Jesus!

Perry initially wanted to remain anonymous for his generous giving, but soon, the secret must’ve leaked and he took to Twitter to confirm his Santa-like endeavors.

“I know it’s hard times, everyone’s struggling and I’m just really, really grateful to be able to be in a position to do this,” Perry said in a video. “So, God bless you, go get your stuff and merry Christmas.”

According to him, anyone who had items on layaway at the two Georgia stores before 9:30 a.m. on Thursday were included in Tyler’s payments. Customers only had to pay one cent to pick up their items.

A person close to Perry said he was inspired to donate by watching a segment on Good Morning America. The show covered “Walmart secret Santas” who anonymously paid off single layaway accounts at the store.

A Walmart manager at the Douglasville location, Shameka, said that there’s usually around 1,000 layaway accounts at their location during the holidays. According to the Independent, layaway programs started during the Great Depression in the 1930s when many families didn’t have the coins to pay for items in the present, so they would put them on hold.

The program dipped in popularity in the 1980s, but then came back in the 2010s when Americans suffered major job losses after the recession.

According to Shameka, some charitable people would occasionally come into the Douglasville location and pay off a random person’s layaway account, but she’s never witnessed someone pay off the entire layaway system.

“I was shocked,” said Shameka the manager. “It shows that we know there’s still good people in the world.”

Thank ya kindly Tyler Perry!