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Father Christmas can do astonishing things: make presents to order for every child, fly in a reindeer-drawn sled and remain constantly jolly. But one of his greatest skills is being able to deliver all of those gifts overnight to many millions of homes. Even Amazon can’t match him.
What is more, he drops in everywhere simultaneously, without charge. He does not offer fast-track delivery slots for a one-off price, or annual Santa Prime subscriptions. There is no need to pay for special treatment when he runs a vast, accessible and efficient express door-to-door fulfilment service for all of his believers. A little faith in the big man is a small price to pay for that.
It makes a heartwarming change in a world increasingly demarcated by velvet ropes and priority passes, where tiers of access to goods and services are sold at different rates. Those who do not (or cannot) pay extra have to wait in line for everything from amusement park rides to ski lifts and aircraft boarding. Time is money and there is often a charge for faster gratification.
There used to be a Santa Express Lane at Macy’s department store on 34th Street in Manhattan. Families who wanted to avoid walking through its full Santaland display on the eighth floor, to arrive hot and thirsty more than an hour later at Santa’s throne, could skip the wait for a hug and a photo opportunity. They instead joined a shorter, more direct queue, which was also free but moved quicker.
But when Santa returned from his pandemic break, the Express Lane was no more. This year, everyone from New Yorkers to out-of-towners has had to book a slot for the only line that now exists: arrive on time and join it. The last places for Christmas Day itself were taken from 6.30am on Wednesday, when the online appointments opened and the final dedicated parents rose early to click.
Macy’s tells me that it abandoned the Express Lane because most families preferred “the walk-through experience at Santaland, culminating with a meet and greet with the one-and-only Santa Claus”. I could question the “one and only” given that you get a choice of Santa ethnicities, and stories circulate of Santas in multiple rooms at the end of the journey, but I would not dare.
In any case, I applaud the store’s decision to “maximise holiday cheer” by offering the same options to everyone in a city stuffed with billionaires and others who are eager to cut a deal, or a line. The moral that there are equal opportunities for every family is important, even if honoured more in the breach than the observance for the rest of the year.
This is not an appeal for a complete ban on priority access. We live in a transactional world, as Macy’s knows. The chain received a $5.8bn leveraged buyout bid this month from an investor group that may be interested in its property, including its flagship store in New York City. It also has a lot of intangible assets, such as the fame of its Thanksgiving Day parade.
Outside Macy’s, paying for rapid delivery helped many gifts to arrive on time for Christmas this year. Aside from those flown by sleigh from Lapland, others arrived via container ships, and faced various physical obstacles. It has been harder to get through the Panama Canal because of a severe drought, which has lowered water levels and reduced the number of crossings on offer.
This has led to a backlog of ships waiting to cross between the Atlantic and Pacific, and made it more expensive. Shipowners have paid up to $4mn per slot in auctions for the right to pass through, rather than waiting in line or taking the longer route around South America. Such invisible logistics costs end up being loaded on retailers, and ultimately on shoppers.
It is not immoral to sell time (or the right to save it) in this context. Its value depends on how costly and perishable the cargo is and an auction discriminates efficiently and openly. Better to take bids for quick passage than to force everyone to queue or to encourage bribery by shipowners, like diners greasing the palms of restaurant maître d’s for prompt seating.
The same applies to many fast passes, priority delivery slots and rights to speed. Sometimes I feel like paying a premium and sometimes not: saving time can be as much a commodity as other goods and services. I am not outraged when someone goes before me, provided I can wait comfortably: there can even be satisfaction in saving money by being patient.
But there are other things for which having to take one’s turn with others is integral to the experience. It would have been sacrilegious to sell special rights to jump the long queue to witness Queen Elizabeth II’s lying-in-state last year. As the philosopher Michael Sandel observed in his book What Money Can’t Buy, “treating religious rituals, or natural wonders, as marketable commodities is a failure of respect”.
Santa Claus is a natural wonder, for who else could conjure the logistical miracle that children enjoy each year? I respect Macy’s for behaving like him and treating everyone equally, at least for Christmas.