Santa by Appointment at West Edmonton Mall – The Experience

Do you want the magic of a Santa Claus visit, without the wait in line? Using the ‘Santa by Appointment’ service at West Edmonton Mall, you can get just that – a personalized visit with Santa that includes two sheets of images, four mini-attraction passes and digital files of all the images captured, to bring home.

Walking into Santa by Appointment, we weren’t sure what to expect. Though we’ve seen a lot of Santa Clauses with the kids over the past eight years – we had never taken advantage of the Santa by Appointment. In fact, we didn’t know about it until last year!

Santa by Appointment – the Experience 

We were greeted quickly while the kids checked out the waiting lounge, and asked the kids names before we were invited back into the special area, where the kids had their photo taken with Santa. Starting in the sleigh, for traditional Santa photos, all three kids smiled as Santa joked and laughed with them. Affable, the kids were immediately drawn to him, excited to tell him all about their wishlists.

He was likable, funny and had a genuine vibe – something that isn’t there in every Santa you see. The personalized experience meant extra time, after the wishlists had been announced. During this time, Santa explained about how he hadn’t been able to have enough Hatchimals made this year, and that he would have elves visit to make sure about Olivia’s shoe size, for the shoes that she requested. He mentioned the importance of the girls getting along, and how they were going to be best-friends when they’re older, and explained how they should make sure to show love, every day, to their family members. Impressed, and kind of in awe, we wrapped up our time with a reminder not to argue with one another (how timely with the day that we had experienced) and we left, choosing which pictures we would like to print, while all of the others were loaded on a flash drive for us to take home.

It’s a bit of a splurge at $99, but considering it includes the personalized visit, all of the images captured on a flash drive and two sheets of printed photos to bring home (in addition to the four mini attraction passes), you can bet that we’ll be back, skipping the line, for Santa by Appointment, next year.

Book your time online for Santa by Appointment at West Edmonton Mall. (There is a $20 deposit when booking the appointment with Santa) 

This post was brought to you by West Edmonton Mall – but all opinions are our own. If it wasn’t great – we wouldn’t be sharing it!