Thousands of poppies will be pinned on clothing around the region today, with the first poppy sellers out on the streets about 8.45am.
Poppy Day is always the Friday before Anzac Day, which is next Thursday.
RSA's women's section secretary Jose Ravenwood said the Wanganui RSA receives about 20,000 poppieseach year. Three thousand are taken to cemeteries and a poppy is placed on every marked serviceman's grave. The rest are left for visitors to place on graves if they wish.
The remaining 17,000 are placed on counters and distributed by street sellers who will be out until 4pm.
Poppies are symbolic of lives lost in war. Poppies were among the first flowers to grow on the WWI battlefield of Flanders, Belgium, and were immortalised in Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae's poem In Flanders' Fields.
