Kids across the country call Mrs. Claus, but reach Rep. Loonan instead

Shakopee Valley News

Every day recently, the Shakopee American Family Insurance agency owned by Minnesota Rep. Bob Loonan would get at least one strange phone call.

Usually, soft whispers can be heard in the background. But Loonan's employees know what to do — they put on their best "elf" voice and ask "Are you looking for Santa?"

"You can tell right away it's a call for Santa," said John Loonan, a sales representative and Bob Loonan's son.

The origin of these calls can be traced to the Shakopee Valley News. In 2013, a short story was posted on the newspaper's website about an event where children could call the number listed to reach Santa Claus, Mrs. Claus, the Elf Workshop or the Reindeer Barn. It was sponsored by Loonan's insurance agency and the Shakopee Jaycees.

The number used was the insurance agency's. As the years passed, the article faded into the archives of the internet, but Google would still pull the digits from the article when someone searched "what is Mrs. Claus' phone number," delivering the information in big, bold numbers at the top of the search.

"They call and they're like, 'oh, what is Mrs. Claus doing?'" John Loonan said. "I'm always like, 'Oh, she's on vacation' or 'she had a busy winter. She had to get away from the cold!'"

For a while, the agency would sporadically receive these calls. But in the past few months, the calls ramped up to the point where the agency was getting one or two calls per day, often around lunch time, from children across the country trying to reach the North Pole.

"I try to make up elf names and I'm running out of ideas," John Loonan said. "I would make up elf names from 'Lord of the Rings' characters like Gimli, Legolas. ... There's no way they'd know 'Lord of the Rings' and those names all sound elvish."

If no one answers, the children sometimes leave voicemails — occasionally more naughty than nice.

"Some of (the voicemails) were a little rude," John Loonan said. "I'd be like, 'Oh, that kid's getting coal for Christmas.'"

Bob Loonan would even get into character as jolly old Saint Nicholas when he took North Pole calls.

"Bob would answer and he'd change his voice and ... I'd be like 'Dad, they heard you talk earlier,'" John Loonan said. "But he'd be like 'Oh, this is Santa.' ... He likes playing the part."

With his fluffy, white beard, Bob Loonan is a natural to play Santa Claus. It's not new to him — every year around Christmas, his children dress as elves and he dons the iconic red suit to surprise family and friends. He'll even leave presents outside in the cold so children think they've been in a sleigh all night.

The staff was fine with the calls for awhile but lately, it's got to be too much. The agency asked the Valley News to remove the article, so now a Google search for Mrs. Claus' phone number no longer shows the agency's number.

"Santa had a good run, but he's hanging up the boots," John Loonan said.

John Loonan has heard the theory that as artificial intelligence assistants like Siri, Alexa or Google Home have risen in popularity, more and more kids are telling the devices to "call Mrs. Claus" — which could explain the recent uptick in calls.

"Any kid could say that, that's easy," John Loonan said. "We figured, alright, time to retire the phone number. It's getting to be a lot."

Even though Google no longer lists the agency number as Mrs. Claus' number, as recently as Thursday, the agency received another one of those strange calls.

"Are you looking for Santa?"