The November winds may feel chilly, but in just a few weeks’ time Santa will arrive to ease the sting. This year’s Santa Stop Tour will roll through Île-des-Chênes on Saturday, December 6. One week later, on December 13, Santa and his motorized sleigh will take another cruise through the streets of Niverville.

The Santa Stop Tour first began in 2020 as a way to bring Christmas cheer to southeastern Manitoba during the pandemic lockdowns. It was the brainchild of Santa Thom, Santa Claus’s trusty Manitoban sidekick.

Since that time, the Santa Stop Tour has become a much-anticipated tradition, bringing smiles and happy laughter to children and adults alike.

While Thom started off as a one-man show in the early days, the parade is evolving and growing as more communities get on board.

This year, Santa’s Niverville parade will be chaperoned by the Niverville Fire Department and accompanied by Helping Hands and Operation Red Nose.

In Île-des-Chênes, the community is invited to join in the parade with their own decorated vehicles, travelling down Main Street to Dumaine. Prior to the parade, families are invited to the TC Energy Centre for Santa’s Workshop and photos with the man in red.

Niverville families will also have an opportunity for photos on Santa’s lap on November 30 at the CRRC.

History of the Santa Stop Tour

Santa Thom hails from La Broquerie and has been filling Santa’s big boots for most of his adult life. With a natural full beard and a physique that matches that of his North Pole counterpart, the role just works, especially considering his jolly disposition and affinity for making kids smile.

For more than a decade before the COVID-19 pandemic, Santa Thom played the part at corporate functions and private family gatherings. For some families, he’s now the centre of attention for a second generation of kids.

Thom still gets choked up when he thinks about how a pandemic almost stole Christmas.

“I wanted people to see that there was still hope, still Christmas,” Thom says.

He recalls the frustration he encountered when trying to plan a Santa parade in the face of heavy pandemic restrictions. According to Manitoba Health, the parade couldn’t involve more than one vehicle. It couldn’t make stops and the route couldn’t be posted for the public to see. All these restrictions were in service of preventing people from gathering in groups.

Under tight rules, Santa Thom wound through nine rural communities on his pickup-drawn sleigh. The number of towns has since grown and changed, depending on where he feels people are most receptive.

Still, his goal is the same as it was when the Santa Stop Tour first began.

“I want communities to gather. How many people know their neighbours these days? [When I come through], people come out of their homes, gather together, the kids are playing and the parents are talking. That’s what I want to see.”

Every year, too, the sleigh gets a little more ornate and events are added to his tour dates. In 2025, Santa Thom is scheduled for 47 different events between now and Christmas. For some of those events, Mrs. Santa will join him.

Much of what Thom has been doing comes from the goodness of his heart and his own pocketbook. But gas is expensive and sleighs aren’t cheap to maintain. With all the events he’s booked, it’s also taken a small army of people to assist in pulling it all together.

For that reason, Thom is seeking sponsorship. Ideally, he says, he’d be happy if he could get one corporate community sponsor for every event he takes part in.

Sponsorship has three different levels—friends of Santa, the elf package, and the Rudolph package—ranging from $200 to $500. In return, he’ll provide varying levels of sponsor advertising, including a company logo right on the sleigh.