The Economics of Being a Shopping Mall Santa

The San Francisco Chronicle reports on being Santa:

The malls provide space, do advertising and create the set -- no small endeavor, as it must be set up during the after-hours graveyard shift and often requires heavy equipment. Sets can cost as little as $20,000 or as much as several hundred thousand dollars and usually last about four or five years, industry sources said.

A professional full-time Santa averages $8,000 for the five- or six-week season, but some malls pay extra to fly in and lodge particularly popular Santas. Most malls start their Santa programs in early- to mid-November.

A typical regional mall generates about $400,000 in photo-with-Santa sales, according to industry sources. While arrangements vary, the photo agency generally pays about a quarter of that to the mall.

Few jobs pay as good for just being plump.