- Everybody wants to know about the beard,
but nobody questions the cookie zone.
Nobody has ever asked me, "Is the cookie zone real?"
One glance, they're like,
"Yeah, he's for sure a fat guy.
"But I wonder if he's faking the facial fur."
♪ Christmas Day ♪
- Hi, my name is Santa Tom Giddings.
I'm a real bearded Santa.
- Santa Ric Erwin here
with the Fraternal Order of Real Bearded Santas.
- Today we're here to answer some questions for y'all.
- So without any further ado, let's see who's first.
Do you keep a naughty/nice list for people
in your day-to-day life?
Ho ho ho ho ho!
Well, yeah.
People who know me know better than to be naughty anywhere
anytime I'm around, so.
- I do, in my head and in my heart.
- What do you do when a child accuses you
of not being the real Santa?
Ho ho!
Every Santa deals with this different,
but I'll say something like, "You don't think I'm real?"
(thunder crackles)
(cat yowls)
"Do you think Christmas is real?"
(horse neighs)
That's how evil I am.
All right.
- You just try to explain to them that
Santa, the real Santa, is more in their heart than anything,
and we're here to help them, to help Santa out,
to find out who's being naughty and nice,
and we just try to give them answers
that make them wonder whether we could be real or fake.
- What is your favorite kind of cookie?
Now you're gonna hear from almost everybody
that this changes from time to time,
and for Santa, it's just as true.
My favorite this year is white chocolate chip macadamia.
But I'd have to say if there was an all-time average,
my lifetime favorite is still oatmeal raisin.
- Chocolate chip.
Second favorite would be sugar cookie.
There's nothing like a good warm chocolate chip cookie
waiting for me at night.
- Do kids ever tug at your real or fake beard?
Everybody tugs at my beard.
Grown-ups.
And I've gotta tell ya,
after all these years, it kind of bugs me
that everybody wants know about the beard,
but nobody questions the cookie zone.
Nobody has ever asked me, "Is the cookie zone real?"
One glance, they're like, "Yeah, he's for sure a fat guy.
"But I wonder if he's faking the facial fur."
- And yeah, a lot of times, the kids will ask me
if I'm the real Santa,
and I'll just go, "What do you think?"
and let them pull on my beard.
And nine times out of 10, if they're on the fence,
that pushes 'em back over the fence
to where they're like, "Oh, that is Santa.
"Awesome."
- What made you want to be a professional Santa?
Here's a cute one.
My wife was heading an employee committee
for collection of food, and at the meeting,
one of them noted that a couple of the families
had young kids, and it would be so nice
if they could have the package delivered by Santa.
And they all laughed
and admitted that it wasn't in their budget.
And then a minute later, one of the women said,
"You know, I think I know
"where there is an old Christmas suit
"in our attic somewhere that nobody has worn in years.
"But I don't think any of us could wear it."
They were all women.
And they all had a good laugh about that.
But my wide brought the house down when she said,
"Well, I know where there's a fat man
"with nothing better to do on Saturday morning,
"so bring the suit in."
She did, and I gotta tell ya,
when she brought that suit home the next day,
it was the cheapest thing I have ever seen.
I am not kidding.
It's one of those pajama suits that you get online.
It tied behind the neck.
My wife said, "How do you feel?"
I said.
(intense music)
"10 feet tall, bulletproof, and I'm thinking I can fly."
Yep, a couple years later,
I had spent my kid's college fund on costumes and apparel.
- My brother-in-law is a professional Santa also,
so my sister approached me.
She said the money was good.
The money was good.
I stayed in it because it's really, again, heartwarming.
I really enjoy the touching stories.
I could shave off my beard and grow it back
before Christmas again, and I don't,
because I go yearlong as Santa Clause.
Everybody I know knows me as Santa.
- Thoughts on candy corn?
It's neither.
- I love candy corn.
It's really, really good.
Only problem is, now I have dentures,
so it's harder to eat candy corn and gummy-type food.
But candy corn is good.
It's more of a Halloween candy,
but it's good year round, I think.
Like pumpkin spice.
It shouldn't be a seasonal thing.
It should be year round.
- Are professional Santas allowed to be lactose intolerant?
Well, I tell you what, we come from all across the spectrum,
so some of us must be.
I'm not.
So feel free to leave milk out for me any time you want to,
with either of my favorite types of cookies,
referred to earlier.
- Well, nowadays, thank goodness we have almond milk
and soy milk and every kind of milk you can think of.
So yeah, it's okay nowadays.
It was harder back in the old days.
(man retching)
Thank goodness for chocolate chip cookies and soy milk.
- What is the least favorite part
of being a professional Santa?
- Seriously, the hardest thing about
being a professional Santa is
working with an aging demographic.
People that I've been working with for 17 years,
some of them were much older when I started,
and some of them are no longer with us.
So when a Santa takes his final sleigh ride,
that's my least favorite part of being Santa.
- Probably not being able to be a professional Santa
all year long.
It's really, really a blast to be a Santa.
Everybody asks me,
"I bet you love seeing the kids' eyes light up."
And yeah, the kids are great,
but seeing the parents' eyes light up is even better.
It's just, again, heartwarming.
I love what I do.
- Favorite part of being a professional Santa?
Wow, that's a list.
(intense music)
10 feet tall and bulletproof pretty much covers it.
When you're walking through a crowd
and the people are getting out of your way
and the fur is swishing
and you get these big hand movements going
and traffic is backing up
and the helicopters are overhead,
that's my favorite part of being a professional Santa.
Oh, and rides on unusual craft.
I've been, I've arrived at events in police cars,
by train, by fire truck, obviously, a number of times.
We were supposed to come in by blimp one time,
and the blimp was grounded.
- The joy, the smiles on everybody's faces.
It's hard to explain, but it's very, very heartwarming.
I hate to be repetitive, but it's very rewarding.
It's a very rewarding profession.
I don't even think of it as a profession.
It's more, they say if you love what you do,
you're not doing a job, so to me, it's not a job.
It's a portrayal.
- Oh, wow, you guys ran out of questions
long before I ran out of stories,
but I see the staff watching their wrists,
so I guess I've been a little long-winded.
- I appreciate your time.
Thank you for asking all these questions.
Hopefully I've answered them to your,
to the best of my knowledge and to your satisfaction.
- I thank you guys for your attention and cooperation
in this very important matter.
- I hope you all have a great Christmas, and ho--
- Ho. - Ho.
- Merry Christmas.
(festive music)