Santa Claus
Parades, department stores, and shopping malls

Actors portraying Santa Claus are present at various venues in the weeks leading up to Christmas. The practice of this has been credited to James Edgar, as he started doing this in 1890 in his Brockton, Massachusetts department store. Having a Santa actor set up to take pictures with children is a ritual that dates back at least to 1918. An area is often set aside for the actors portraying Santa to use for the duration of the holiday season. It usually features a chair for the actors to sit in surrounded by various holiday-themed decorations. In Canada, malls operated by Oxford Properties established a process by which autistic children could "visit Santa Claus" at the mall without having to contend with crowds. The malls open early to allow entry only to families with autistic children, who have a private visit with the actor portraying Santa Claus. In 2012, the Southcentre Mall in Calgary was the first mall to offer this service.

In the United Kingdom, discount store Poundland changes the voice of its self-service checkouts to that of Santa Claus throughout the Christmas retail period.

There are schools offering instruction on how to act as Santa Claus. For example, children's television producer Jonathan Meath studied at the International School of Santa Claus and earned the degree Master of Santa Claus in 2006. It blossomed into a second career for him, and after appearing in parades and malls, he appeared on the cover of the American monthly Boston Magazine as Santa. There are associations with members who portray Santa; for example, Mr. Meath was a board member of the international organization called Fraternal Order of Real Bearded Santas.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many Santa grottos were not operating for the 2020 Christmas season. Due to this, some companies offered video calls for a fee using apps such as Zoom where children could speak to an actor who was dressed as Santa Claus.

In 2021, Walt Disney World and Disneyland featured for the first time Black cast members portraying Santa.
detectable_format:json_format