Sacré bleu! Santa shortage hits France

Establishments across France are struggling to recruit actors and casual workers to play Father Christmas. Photo / 123rf
The country is struggling to find Santas, with employment agencies saying working conditions and retiring talent are making it hard to fill Father Christmas’ famous boots.
Rude children and long hours are causing a Father Christmas shortage in France as men increasingly refuse to take on the jolly white-bearded role.
As the festive season approaches, employment agencies have warned that cities, schools, businesses and shopping centres across the country were struggling to recruit actors and casual workers to play Father Christmas.
Kari Bounabi, the founder of the events agency Interim Spectacle, said he was looking for about 100 Father Christmas stand-ins for the festive season.
“We used to have a local network of people who were used to doing this, but they’re all retiring or don’t want to do it anymore,” he told French broadcaster BFMTV.
“You have to make twice as many phone calls.”
Playing Father Christmas – or Père Noël in French – “no longer appeals to anyone, either in terms of the human experience or for the CV”, he explained.
“People don’t particularly want to work with children anymore. The festive spirit is being lost,” he said.
Lorine Bartoll, the director of an events agency in the Rhône-Alpes region, said one pensioner who had played Father Christmas for years decided to hang up his boots because of “kids screaming all day [and] disrespectful parents”.
“I think he got fed up,” she said, adding that the last straw was when the 60-year-old was urinated on by a child while posing for photos and then two families ended up brawling while queuing for presents.
“It’s hard to find replacements, even though it pays well,” Bartoll said, despite some of her Father Christmases earning several thousand euros a week. “But you have to find them! It’s a very special role. You can’t give it to just anyone.
“It takes a lot of energy and patience to stay cheerful all day long.”
Frédérick Manzorro, a professional Father Christmas for the past six years in the Lyon area, said he was doing a roaring trade and had to turn down 30 requests this winter. But he said it wasn’t for the faint-hearted.
“It’s a thankless job, after all: it’s hot and itchy in the suit, and you really have to get into a role. You can’t settle for the bare minimum: you need a voice, specific body language, and you have to pay attention to what you say.”
Based in Alsace, the Hors Médias agency said it was forced to launch an appeal on social networks.
“We’re using every possible communication channel. We started looking as early as October, but it’s no use, there’s no interest anymore,” one unnamed manager was cited as saying.
“It’s complicated because we’re looking for fairly specific profiles, people who like human contact, are serious and have a clean criminal record. And these are one-off contracts.”
One Father Christmas in the Loire Valley recently threw in the towel mid-contract as he was tired of being insulted or threatened by parents.
He said he was also tired of being shouted at in the streets with taunts such as “go back to the North Pole”, regional daily La Nouvelle République reported.