In just a few days, you’ll wake up to find that some guy has snuck into your house and put a bunch of stuff under a tree in your living room. This is called “Christmas” and it’s pretty much everyone’s favorite day of the year. But not yours. No, as a student here at the Sean Adams University for Business Management Development Leadership, you need to realize that Santa’s business model is inherently flawed. Here are the reasons why:
1. His targeted demographic is too broad: Imagine you owned a pizza place. Who would be your ideal customer? A guy who likes pizza, right? Well, if Santa ran a pizza place the way he runs Christmas, he’d try to make pizzas for people who like pizza, pizzas for people who don’t like pizza, pizzas for people who cry when they see cheese, pizzas for people who don’t believe in circles, everyone! That’s just not a practical. You gotta narrow in on the exact demographics you want or else you risk diluting your brand.
2. He hires deer: Sometimes hiring a wild animal is a good idea, but not when they’re deer. Think about it: what is it that deer are best at? Prancing around, standing in fields, and looking scared in front of headlights. Translation: they don’t take things seriously, they’re lazy, and when the going gets tough, they freeze. Translation-translation: they’re bad hires.
3. His hours of operation are all wrong: Sure, it would be nice to work 10 hours, 4 days a week; you’d get a 3-day weekend every weekend! But working 24 hours straight so you can get a 364-day weekend? That’s crazy. And dangerous. You have a slow day at your yarn shop? No big deal. Maybe the weather will be a bit scarf-ier tomorrow. But what if you’re not open tomorrow? What if that slow day just happens to be THE ONLY DAY YOU’RE OPEN ALL YEAR? Then, you’re screwed.
4. He hasn’t kept up with the times: A sleigh makes sense… if it’s medieval times. These days, we have cars. And airplanes. And machines that build the toys quicker than a bunch of claymation elves, but Santa doesn’t care. He just keeps doing what he’s always done while the world leaves him behind.
5. He charges cookies, not money: this one’s really the biggest, really. If you want to make money, you need to charge money. You can’t take a plate of cookies to the bank. Because cookies aren’t currency. If they were, the richest people in the world would all be bakers. Also, banks would smell awesome, but banks don’t smell bad as is, so that’s kind of like fixing something that’s not broken. What I’m getting at: don’t be like Santa. Charge people MONEY for your goods and services.
Of course, you might disagree with me. So, feel free to disagree with my opinions of Santa Claus in the comments.