I've read two of Gordon Bailey's books and have found them to be the most comprehensive Santa training available.  Santa Gordon has years of experience which he has organized in an easy to read format.  

Personally, any question that I have had, Santa Gordon has experienced and found a solution for.  His comments and suggestions come from a "been there, done that" perspective.  He has spent many years as a Traditionally Bearded Santa and as a Naturally Bearded Santa.  Gordon also has been a children's and adult entertainer.  Gordon's experiences include but are not limited to:  Ballooning, Magic, Clowning, as a Pirate, make-up and costuming consultant, and of course as an independent and mall Santa Claus.

Gordon's class information has always been very practical, useful, and heartfelt.  Gordon's abilities to combine Santa Claus and business is very well thought out and explained in a practical manner.  If you don't learn a thing about Santa Claus portraying, the value of his business training is worth the price of tuition alone.  But the fact is you will learn BOTH the finer points of Santa Claus portrayal AND Santa Claus business by reading his books and attending his traveling school.  Should Santa Gordon bring his school to your area, I urge you to attend if at all possible. 

Thank you Santa Marty for the endorsement! As always your words are very kind. With the addition of the third book the class now has 4 distinct topics of exploration during the lecture. The first day we work through the first 2 books with a quick overview and question session at the start of the second day of class. Then we plunge into the third book for the second half of the class. That book alone is fairly dense with information on performance and history/background of the Santa character. As one teacher says, it helps to have a "bulletproof" background story filled out with details and plausibility.

This is the third year of operation and the classes include new Santas (first year) seasoned Santas (3 to 7 years) and old pro Santas (8 to 25 years experience) and each has left the class with fresh ideas, new concepts and illumination of how the information is applied in the "Real World" performance arena. Having the books available on Amazon and Amazon UK has been a wonderful surprise as people around the world have been buying them simply to read as stand alone instructionals.  Overtime they will become "Dated" as some of the information will become obsolete as businesses and people leave the industry but the lessons will remain valid. 

Of the three books though, Vol.3 will remain the longest enduring of the textbooks because of the information and lessons in it are virtually timeless.  The performance issues that are addressed in varying degree in most Santa schools take up a full 7 hours of lecture out of the 16 hours of class time all on the second day. Almost half and it still barely scratches the surface of performance issues that have been identified by many in the past here in question threads and on other social media. Each year I have had more new first year students and the classes have been increasing. I am targeting (hopefully) doing 10 classes a year across the country  and this year the price per student ha been held over from the 2015 price even though the curriculum expanded by over 33% and the lecture portion grew by 2 hours to accommodate that.  The research and lecture is constantly updated year to year and the materials provided to the students has grown over the years in ways other than just the text books. Vendors have been added to most classes along with the "handouts" that accompany the textbooks.

For all of that the SatBobS class is a "Gen Ed" experience with a wide range of topics covered. Right now, one of my students from the 2014 class year, Robert Seutter aka Santa True (a 30 * year story teller and performer) is working on his own class/school that focuses completely on performance focused on the Santa venue. Not business, not finding employment or how to price your services but strictly performance and after the 40 page chapter he wrote for my school on that subject in the books, I can honestly say his school will be one that every Santa will be taking if they want to succeed against the competition. In True's classes and workshops to date, he has taken the information given to a serious college level of examination. What True talks about in 6 hours on performance took me about 5 years of serious study in the library of the Academy of Magical Arts and Science.  In another year or so, you might see True bringing a class to your area. I really recommend it!

As always, May your season be Joyous!

Yours, 

Santa Gordon

satbobs.com 

You are again too kind.  It is my hope to bring some new tools and perspective to our craft, and I really appreciate your support and training.