Christmas tree, wake up: prices for New Year’s performances have tripled

Parents who had preoccupied themselves with gifts for the New Year found that they had become much more expensive – both the sweet gifts that are traditionally given at festive performances, and the performances themselves for children, and calling Father Frost and the Snow Maiden to their home. But you still need to at least symbolically present New Year’s souvenirs to teachers at school and kindergarten teachers. The rise in prices puts not only parents, but also children’s mentors in a difficult position.

According to official data, sweet New Year’s gifts in Russia have risen in price by 20% compared to last year, as they consist mainly of chocolates, and chocolate prices have increased all over the world. There are also problems of their own: New Year’s performances for children have tripled in price compared to last year. And not only due to the gifts given, but also due to the rise in prices for the services of artists. Thus, an hour-long performance from Father Frost and the Snow Maiden this December will cost from 20 to 40 thousand rubles, and on New Year’s Eve itself – up to 90 thousand rubles. This amount is obtained from the starting price, to which the script, music, costumes, logistics are added and the proximity to the New Year is taken into account. At the same time, the “average price for a performance for children” with a visit to your home, kindergarten or school, as of November 13, starts at 4,500 rubles.

I’m calling to find out what is included in this amount. And I find out that there is almost nothing.

“4500 is the number from which your holiday begins,” the girl in the turnkey office of Father Frosts and Snow Maidens kindly answers. – There is a price calculator on our website. Enter all the data – where you call the artists, date, time, duration of the performance, choose the script, musical accompaniment and costumes of the artists from the photo – and get your price. The closer to the New Year, the more expensive it is. And in general, today we have only 23 pairs of artists left, all the rest are booked to capacity.

– And if I refuse the musical accompaniment and your script and choose basic costumes, will I keep it to 4500?

– No, for 4500 Santa Claus can call your child via video link.

Let’s find out how parents get out of the situation.

“I have two children, the eldest is in 3rd grade, the youngest is in kindergarten,” says Muscovite Yulia. “Both are of such an age that a New Year’s fairy tale is still needed, but this year it will clearly blow us out of the budget. The kindergarten collects 3 thousand each to organize a New Year’s party with Father Frost and the Snow Maiden. Fortunately, this amount already includes a sweet table for the children, but parents must buy New Year’s costumes for the carnival themselves. And separately, the parent committee collects money for gifts for the head and teachers. We haven’t decided yet how much we’ll rent for, but obviously no less than 2-3 thousand. And I’ll definitely buy something for the nannies, ours are sometimes more sensitive than everyone else. The school collects 5 thousand for the New Year’s holiday, this amount seems to include souvenirs for teachers and the children themselves. Although last year at the last moment it turned out that they were not included. But that year they collected 3 thousand.

– Will you give in for everything?

– Yes, what should I do? But the problem is that our children also write letters to Santa Claus every year with wishes. And these wishes are not cheap. This year we will have to give up “magic letters”. Although I foresee tears.

It turns out that the rise in price puts teachers themselves, both school and preschool, in an awkward position.

“All of our parents donated 3 thousand for the New Year’s party,” shares a kindergarten teacher from the Moscow region, “except for two.” And we have a matinee on a weekday, that is, these two children will also be brought to the garden. What am I supposed to do? Don’t let them come to the party? But if the kindergarten hosts these two at its own expense for the holiday and gives gifts, then next year no one will give it to Santa Claus at all!

The class teacher at school says that in a similar situation she got out of the situation in her own way.

“In my class, three parents didn’t pass for the holiday,” says Marina Semyonovna, a mathematics teacher who also has a class teacher. “On the advice of a friend, I called a parent meeting and at the end of it started talking about the holiday. She said that everyone had passed, except for three families. And if they don’t pass so stubbornly, it means they have serious financial problems. And she offered to help them with the whole world – to distribute their contributions to everyone, including me, as the class teacher. So the parents felt ashamed, and they handed over the money.

Meanwhile, the chairman of the LDPR, Leonid Slutsky, called the increase in prices for children’s New Year’s events and gifts “unreasonable” and appealed to the head of the FAS (Federal Antimonopoly Service) with a request to conduct an inspection among the organizers of the New Year’s fairy tale for abuse and collusion.