It’s that time of year again when parents bring their little ones to see the jolly fellow dressed in red so they can sit on his lap and have their picture taken with him. So pull out the Christmas sweaters, jingle bell collars and holiday leashes and take your furry, feathery or scaly pet child to see Santa, starting this Saturday, on December 6th at a local PetSmart store.
For the next three weekends December 6-7, 13-14 and 20-21st the annual Photos with Santa program will be offered at PetSmart stores across the country from 11:00a.m. -4:00p.m. It is a great opportunity to make a holiday memory with your pet while also donating to an animal welfare organization in your city. The cost for a digital picture and a holiday frame is $9.95.
This is a wonderful program for animal rescue groups because $5.00 from every picture sold is donated to a local non-profit animal organization. I have participated, as an elf photographer, for the past eight years and will again be snapping away this Saturday.
The program works like this; PetSmart provides all of the equipment for the pictures and processing, plus the frames and a Santa suit. The local charity provides the manpower, which usually includes one volunteer Santa Claus, a couple of elves and a volunteer to print the pictures. My group,
Heaven Can Wait Sanctuary, will be participating in three different stores on all three weekends of the event. We typically take pictures of 100 pets each day and with a donation of $5.00 for each picture; Photos with Santa is a pretty profitable fundraising event.
In addition to being lucrative, Photos with Santa is fun. Rescue groups have holiday costumes for your pet to wear like; reindeer antlers, holiday collars, Santa hats and more. Plus volunteers are ready to not only snap a picture of your pet, but the entire family as well.
Over the years I have also had an interesting array of pets taking their pictures with Santa. Of course there are always the adorable puppies, kittens, cats and dogs, but some unusual pets have visited too. There has been a baby kangaroo, several iguanas, one snake, a turtle, and several parrots. So whatever type of pet you have, I hope you will find time to create a holiday memory and make a donation to the groups who are trying to solve the problem of homeless pets in your city.
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