Sleigh bells could be ringing long after the holidays – at least if a handful of "Santa-preneurs" have anything to say about it.
A group of serious Santas have founded a nonprofit startup – North Carolina Friends of Santa. And unlike Santa Claus at the North Pole, they work year-round, responding to disasters throughout eastern North Carolina, with toys in tow.
“We just want children to remember that Santa is looking after them all year round,” said Santa – well, Santa Jim, also known as Jim Hastings, the president of the nonprofit.
As Hastings tells it, the startup began nearly five years ago with a couple of Santas sitting around talking – wishing they could do more as hurricanes hammered the coast. They turned to some elves (also known as attorneys) and, armed with advice from similar groups around the country, filed the papers to get started.
Over the years, they’ve hosted toy drives and teamed up with disaster relief organizations – swooping in with toys to save the day.
Take the tornados that happened during Hurricane Isaias in 2020. Hastings and his fellow Clauses went to Bertie County with a bag full of toys.
It gets emotional – even for the jolliest of elves. He recalls a 5-year-old telling Santa how a “storm came … and the next thing we knew, the house just turned over and everything was gone.”
“That’s why we do it,” Hastings said, noting the parents are busy taking care of the essentials – food and shelter. “The parents are concerned with the overall stuff and, all of a sudden it dawns on them … the kids don’t have any toys.”
Fellow Santa Bill Himes said it’s part of the calling.
Himes, like Hastings, dons the suit professionally. Like Hastings, he fills his calendar with appearances – and gets paid to do it. But he said that, for him, putting on the suit is bigger than a job. It’s a mission. That’s why he teamed up with the group.
Hastings said it’s common sentiment. Being Santa is so special that area Santas actually meet up year-round through different groups, including the “Triangle Santas,” which is where discussions around North Carolina Friends of Santa began.
To understand the mission, you have to understand Santa. And to understand Santa, you really have to wear the hat, they say.
Why Santa?
Hastings’ Santa origin story began just before he retired from the Durham Public School System in 2007. He had decided to grow a beard and, much to his surprise, it turned out fluffy white.
That’s when a little girl at church rushed over saying, “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
“She thinks you’re Santa,” her mom told Hastings.
“And I said well, I know what I’m doing when I retire,” Hastings recalled.
Bill Himes’ Santa story also began with a beard. Himes, also a retired educator, was still teaching when, eight years ago, a PTA president “came up to me and essentially volun-told me that I was going to be the Santa for a Christmas fair.”
“She said, you have a white bears, we’re going to rent you a suit, and you’re going to be Santa,” Himes said.
He still remembers the moment he put on the big red suit.
“You hear sometimes people talk about the magic of Santa?” Himes said. “There was this change in me. I just became Santa. It just felt right.”
The suit was just the beginning for Hastings and Himes.
Over the years, it’s transitioned from a fanciful side project to a real gig. Hastings even went to Santa school in Minnesota.
“We take it really seriously,” he said. “It’s an entire subculture that’s out there. It’s a new world.”
Add in a nationwide Santa shortage – yes that’s a thing – and Himes has about 55 appearances, including stints at Cabela’s and Bass Pro Shops as the jolly St. Nick.
“I don’t have a day off until the twenty-second of December,” he said in an interview just before Thanksgiving.