North Pole, PLLC

by Michael Heatherly

I was wracking my brain for an appropriate holiday Bar Beat when I ran into a law school classmate, Joy Tinsel, who was in town for a CLE on winter-wonderland-use law. For the past 17 years, Joy has been in-house counsel for Santa Claus International, PLLC, under which St. Nick and his toy factory operate. Joy was kind enough to grant me an interview.

MH: How did you come to be in-house counsel for Santa?

JT: When I graduated from law school, I was looking for something out of the ordinary. I saw a notice in the career center for an in-house position involving varied practice areas, including employment, aviation, and animal law. I was fascinated and sent in my résumé. I guess they liked me.

MH: Does the employment aspect of the job involve managing the elf work force?

JT: Yes, but we don’t use the “e” word. As specified in their union contract, they are “vertically compact gift-processing professionals,” or GPPs.

MH: Do tensions develop between management and labor during what must be a hectic holiday season up there?

JT: There’s always something. Last year a disgruntled GPP tried to leak the “who’s been naughty and nice” list to the tabloids. We nipped it in the bud, but can you imagine the liability we would have faced if that list had gotten out: invasion of privacy, breach of confidentiality, libel? It kept me up a few nights.

MH: You mentioned animal law was involved in your work, too. That has to do with the reindeer, I assume?

JT: Right. A few years ago we had a little dustup. PETA filed a petition alleging we were abusing the reindeer. They sent a half-dozen B-list actresses in reindeer costumes up to picket. We invited them inside to inspect our facility, and they saw there was no abuse involved. In fact, 364 days a year, the reindeer have the easiest life you could imagine, hanging out in our state-of-the-art indoor grazing facility. To keep everyone happy, we allow an SPCA representative to ride along every Christmas Eve.

MH: With all the strife in the world today, does Santa get nervous flying across so many international borders in an unarmed sleigh?

JT: That issue keeps us busy all year. We have to get advance clearance to fly into the airspace of every Santa-compatible nation in the world. One mistake and a heat-seeking missile could end Christmas for good.

MH: What about Santa’s exposure to liability claims?

JT: Oh, Santa has insurance up the, uh, chimney. It gets costlier every year. Imagine what the premium is to ensure an operation in which a 1,700-year-old guy flies a reindeer-powered aircraft around the world in the middle of the night, lands on people’s roofs, and sneaks into their homes! What could possibly go wrong with that, right? The only carrier we got a bid from this year was AIG and, well, I don’t think we’ll be renewing with them. We may have to self-insure from now on.

MH: What other legal issues keep you busy?

JT: We have the usual matters all organizations deal with — contracts, real estate, asset management. Like everybody else, Santa took quite a hit in the stock market this year. The guy has built up a pretty hefty portfolio over the years, but he doesn’t want to hang up the gift bag for good until the economy stabilizes.

MH: Most of the gifts kids get today are name-brand items. Do you manufacture that stuff under license, or how does that work?

JT: Well, we try not to publicize this too much, but we buy a lot of merchandise wholesale and we outsource manufacturing of the rest. Santa resisted it for years, but the truth is we just can’t compete on manufacturing costs with the rest of the world. Of course, at the North Pole we still have a huge gift-wrapping and distribution center, which keeps the GPPs busy full-time.

MH: It was great seeing you, Joy. Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions.

JT: It was my pleasure, and please pass along Santa’s best holiday wishes to our friends in WSBA. 

Michael Heatherly practices up north in Bellingham and can be reached at 360-312-5156 or barnewseditor@wsba.org.