Any clues as to who stole Santa's letter box?

The Grinch who Stole Christmas won't get away with it - that the message from Birds Supervalu in Navan, where some nasty thieves stole Santa's Christmas letter box on Friday.

The staff were heartbroken to discover the theft and have launched an internet appeal for people to share the news, so that children who had posted letters up to and including Friday will post new ones.

'We send all the letters to Santa and he writes back to each child, so we want to make sure everyone knows what happened and that they post their letters again,' says store manager, Lisa Murdiff.

The letter box was at the entrance to the popular supermarket and the theft was discovered on Saturday.

'A man and his son came looking for Santa's letter box, so we brought them to where it should be and thats when we discovered it was stolen.

'We looked around the car park and estates around us to see if whoever had stolen it had torn it up or thrown it away, but we found nothing,' Lisa says.

'There was nothing valuable in it so we just believe it was troublemakers.'

She is appealing to everyone to share the story as much as possible so that it reaches as many children and their parents as possible and those who had posted their letters before the theft will know to post the letter again.

'Santa replies to each letter he receives from our post box, so it is important he gets the letters.'

She also appealed to whoever stole the letter box, not to be a grinch and to leave it back.

Meanwhile Santa is visiting Birds Supermarket in Beechmount on Saturday at 2pm.