Pictures with Santa no longer free

[theantiquetiger]

I want to thank the Mall of Louisiana for screwing up a Christmas tradition. A new company took over the Santa village this year and now you cannot take your own picture of your kids with Santa. The smallest price is $20 for a 5x7, and it is a crappy picture taken by people with zero photography skills. I did sneak my own shot while Santa and the "photographer" were distracted. My shot was not the greatest but still 1000x better than the crap they tried to sell me. I just told them it was a crappy picture and I didn't want it.

I am not trying to be cheap. I would pay the $20 if they offered something worth a crap. I even offered to buy a copy if they let me take one myself. Stores bring Santa in to get people there to shop, not drop $20-$200 on some crappy pictures taken by a non-trained "photographer". I even offered to buy a CD copy so I could fix it, they would not do that as well.


The focal point was on Santa's face, so I missed the girls' eyes. I only had a split second to take it.

[Mikey]

Wow !!!, that looks like a Hallmark card !!!!!

[Earth 2 Chris]

Not real smart of them considering how many people shop online nowadays. That is one thing you CAN'T get online.

Great pic, by the way!

Chris

[wayne foundation 07]

Picture came out great, they started doing that (charging and not letting you take your own) around here a couple years ago. They even started shining bright lights behind the photogapher to block any good pictures from being taken by cheap parents like you lol.

[HardyGirl]

I've never heard of parents taking pics w/ Santa. The malls I've gone to, you've always had to pay for them. Even when I went to Macy's when I was 2, I believe Mom paid for that too. But your pic turned out great!

[silveralex]

Like HardyGirl said , I've never had any free pics with Santa as an option around me (NY).
But tat is a great pic, amazed you got it on the sly!

[jwyblejr]

The manager at Kroger use to do the Santa bit. He only had to put on the suit. Use to tell the kids that shopped there that he was moonlighting as the manager.

[SeattleEd]

I've never heard of parents taking pics w/ Santa. The malls I've gone to, you've always had to pay for them. Even when I went to Macy's when I was 2, I believe Mom paid for that too. But your pic turned out great!

Ditto. We've always paid since I could recall. Sears, MayCo and Broadway. Also mall Santas this is back in L.A. and this applied also to Seattle and Portland from what I asked.

[johnnystorm]

They've charged around here for quite a few years for the Santa pics, but only last year did they start telling you that you couldn't take your own photo with your camera. My kid doesn't want to go visit Santa anyway, "she's too big for that now". My bigger complaint is that they used to give the kids a coloring book or such, now they give out a tiny little candy cane, maybe 3" long. Another example of how malls are out of touch with the public, and why there are so many vacant stores in them. heavens forbid they actually try marketing and being proactive toward customers, like printing a free photo for you. What's invested, a dozen ink cartridges & some photo paper? It's all digital anymore.

BTW, I think a couple places like Bass Pro shops and maybe a few others still do free Santa photos, you should check around.

I can remember as a kid visiting the dept store store when the whole toy dept was Santa's village, and they actually gave you a toy..I remember getting Popeye colorforms- gift wrapped!

[toys2cool]

Same here in Miami, we've always gotten charged...But your pic was great

[Nostalgiabuff]

they've been charging for [pictures here for years. my kids are at the age now where it is not cool to be seen with Santa so I get the pass on paying

[Gorn Captain]

Pretty soon, Santa will be doing conventions and charging for autographs...

[fallensaviour]

I've been paying here for the last sixteen years to have my kids pictures taken with Santa at the mall.

[megoapesnut]

We have a local market in the town I work (Lebanon) and they bring a Santa in the Saturday before Thanksgiving right after the Holiday parade. They not only don't have any problem with you taking your own, they take one and make a print and give it to you free of charge! They started doing this a few years ago and asked me to get them a printer to do so. I just got them another one this year as they couldn't keep up with demand last year.