It’s Santa’s AGM. But he’s not having a happy corporate Christmas

James Moore imagines the scene as Santa and Rudolph face the shareholders

Santa’s revenues are down and he’s struggling to explain it to his shareholders (Reuters)

The scene: the annual meeting of Claus Festive Joy Solutions and Logistics PLC formerly Santa Claus PLC. Chair Rudolph “Red” Reindeer stands up and opens proceedings

Rudolph: “Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, Merry Christmas! I’d like to welcome you to this year’s AGM. In a moment I’ll hand you over to our CEO and founder, Santa Claus.

“First I’d like to make to make a few brief remarks. As you know, we have had a challenging year, however, I want to stress we regard the press attention given to our SantaPlan bonus scheme for our CEO to be entirely unwarranted.

“Yes revenues are down, but Santa is now managing both franchisee and wholly owned logistics and manufacturing operations in a global business. He has an MBA and everything. So please, give us a little rein to explain our current situation. As you will see from the accompanying trading statement, the early signs are that this Christmas should deliver a positive revenue upgrade. Now, over to our CEO for more details about the year we’ve just had.”

Santa Claus: “Thank you Mr Chairman. As you have said, our business has encountered some turbulence of late resulting in a negative revenue growth outcome.

“Our Belief Services division has had to contend with significant digital disruption. We have responded with the launch of our SantaApp that’s now available through Android and iOS. I won’t go into too much granular detail but I’m sure you can see from the rather nice red and green pie chart on the projector, the early trials are producing promising metrics. We believe that this has the potential to future proof our business.

“I can confirm reports that we are in discussions with a major technology company to partner with which has the potential to magically transform the business and result in a material revenue upgrade. I hope to have more news to share with you in the new year.

“Moving on to our Festive Logistics division, our ambition to have a ‘Santa in every town’ remains on track and we are encouraged by the early results from our trials of a franchise model, which we hope to extend into new territories throughout the course of the next year.

“Moving on to Joy Design and Manufacturing, which incorporates the division formerly known as Toy Making, we regret that we have had to make a number of redundancies among our Elfin craft and design partners as a result of our outsourcing programme.

“This has resulted in a certain amount of negative press, which I regret. I believe the phrase “sweatshop” was used in one particularly scurrilous report and I am deeply disappointed at the tone of the coverage. This is an instance that I believe fits the description of ‘fake news’.

“In the meantime, we are confident that our quality assurance programme will serve to address the issues with some of our products and that the recalls we regretfully had to announce earlier this year will not be repeated.

“Our acquisition of Tooth Fairy Inc, since renamed Dental Collection and Acquisition All Year Services, or DeCAY successfully completed earlier this year. We are excited about the contribution this business is already making.

“There have been one or two small issues. It has resulted in a negative impact on our gender pay gap reporting and we have been subject to a legal challenge on equal opportunities grounds.

“I want to stress that the roles are very different. We value the contribution of our tooth fairies, but while they do work all year round as opposed to just the one day, theirs is essentially a collection and retrieval role. We are confident that the cases brought against us will prove to have no merit.

“We have offered places on our Santa training course to a number of the top-performing dental retrieval operatives and we hope this will help to address the issue.

“I want to stress that we are a leader when it comes to the subject of diversity. I’m sure you will by now all have seen our annual report with the picture of the smiling child in a wheelchair taking delivery of one of our festive joy solutions. You should take that as a statement of our intent.”

Rudolph: “Thank you very much Santa. Now I’ll open the floor to questions. There is a microphone at each of the question points. Now, shall we take the left one first? The young lady there. From your badge I see it’s Mary Brown. Is it that?

Mary Brown: “Mary Brown aged eight, and yes that’s right. Thank you Mr Chairman. My older brother has a word for what we’ve just heard but because I don’t want to end up on the CEO’s Negative Behaviour Index that we all used to know as the naughty list, I won’t use it. I’ll just ask this: Do you have the foggiest idea about what it is you’re even doing any more and can you explain even half of what you were talking about?”

Rudolph: “Um… Santa?”

Santa: “Um… Rudolph.”

Rudolph: “Um, I believe we have some customer service representatives outside to answer questions like this. They also have mince pies and some DeCAY branded sweeties! Next question. The young gentlemen? John Smith is it?”

John Smith: “Yes, aged seven and a half. Neither of you mentioned Brexit. Will it have any impact on the business?”

Santa: “Ho, ho, ho, can I take this Rudolph?”

Rudolph: “Of course.”

Santa: “John, I’d refer you to the words that Mary Brown’s brother probably used. It’s complete and utter bollocks. Which is where it will kick us and everyone else.”