You might say Kale Bassler and Terrie Wharton have the St. Nick knack.


The good friends discovered their niche after years of local craft shows at which they peddled reindeer made of clothes pins and other Christmas-themed baubles they had crafted by hand in their Post Falls homes.


One year, they made two- and three-foot tall fancy Santas with handmade clothes and store-bought porcelain faces that proved to be popular on the craft-show circuit. Unsatisfied with a series of Santas with the same expression, however, Bassler and Wharton tried their hand at sculpting and baking clay faces for their Santas. In the process, they transformed their craft into an art formSantas with unique facesthen turned their art form into a fast-growing company, called Northwest Santa Creations.


The company makes Santa figures that retail for between $200 and $600. It expects to sell some 400 of the figures this year, about 30 percent more than last year, Bassler and Wharton say.


Honestly, we werent very good at this other stuff, Bassler says, referring to the earlier crafts they had done. With the Santas, we knew we had something. We said, Lets push the envelope.


The company currently makes seven lines of Santa Claus figures, a Mrs. Claus, and an elf. They also make a mountain man and a chef, though not Christmas themed.


The traditional Santa stands 30 inches tall and sports a rich red velvet suit with white fur trim and black leather boots. One display of Santa and Mrs. Claus features a more leisurely St. Nick in a red button-down shirt with green pants and suspenders leaning against an upholstered wingback chair in which Mrs. Claus rests in a long flower-print dress. A more formal Kriss Kringle, called the Golden Victorian Santa, is featured in flowing gold satin while holding a wooden box and ornate candle.


Theyre classic, says Mary Peak, co-owner of Christmas at the Lake, a retail store in downtown Coeur dAlene that carries Northwest Santa Creations figures. Youre buying something you can hand down in your family rather than something that will be tossed out in three years.


Customers who buy them dont balk at the price, she says, because they view the figures as pieces of art from true craftsmen.


Bassler says she and Wharton are encouraged by the sales growth, especially given the recent economic environment.


If we can sell a high-end product like this at this time, whats it going to be like when things open up again? she says.


To capture potential customers looking for items at a lower price point, Northwest Santa Creations has developed a series of decorative lapel pins that feature miniature versions of their signature Santa faces.


While each face on the figures is hand sculpted and the clothes are sewn individually, the pins are mass-produced to Northwest Santa Creations specifications by an overseas manufacturer.


On the road


This time of year, Bassler and Wharton are whipping around faster than a miniature sleigh with eight tiny reindeer.


They are spending two weeks this month on an artists showcase tour of Costco Wholesale Corp. stores in Southern California. Wharton says Costco brings in craftspeople with high-end, oftentimes seasonal, products to sell their goods through limited-engagement special events.


Between them, Bassler and Wharton are to hit 11 Costco stores in 14 days.


Upon returning to the Northwest, theyll be doing two major craft showsone in the Spokane area and one in Puyallup, Wash.


About three-quarters of the companys annual sales are expected to occur this month through the Costco tour and the craft shows.


To ramp up for the anticipated flurry of sales, Bassler and Wharton had to bring in additional help this year for the first time.


Late this summer and early this fall, they contracted with a seamstress to make some clothes for their Santa figures and a clerical person to handle shipping.


Bassler and Wharton got in with Costco when an acquaintance who does business with the big retailer toted two Santas to the big companys Seattle-area headquarters last year. Costco rejected the idea of stocking the high-end Santas in its stores, but suggested theyd sell well on the special-events circuit.


This is the second year Bassler and Wharton have participated in Costcos special events circuit.


Most of Northwest Santa Creations business up until now has involved selling Santas directly to consumers, through a variety of venues in which Bassler and Wharton appear in person with their products.


The company is trying to shift away from that, however, and attract more wholesale businessrelationships like the one it has with Christmas at the Lake.


After Christmas, Bassler and Wharton plan to set up booths at major trade shows in Atlanta, Dallas, San Francisco, and Seattle. At such shows, merchandise buyers for retail stores order products for the next Christmas season.


Wharton says those shows likely will help Northwest Santa Creations secure additional relationships with small retailers like Christmas at the Lake.


It hopes, however, to attract a national retailer, such as Nordstrom Inc. or Neiman Marcus.


With or without such a mass-marketing deal, Northwest Santa Creations likely will need to hire its first additional permanent employees soon, perhaps a seamstress and a clerical person.


Also, the company is looking to develop its own manufacturing building eventually.


Currently, the operation consumes Whartons basement and also uses a storage unit and mobile trailer to store finished Santas, spare Santa lapel pins, and supplies. Bassler says she and Wharton would like to have everything in one place.


Bassler and Wharton decline to disclose how long it takes to make a Santa, but say everything is handcrafted, and they typically are working on 30 figures at a time.


The hand-sculpted faces are made of a polymer clay that can be baked in a conventional oven.


Neither of the friends has formal training in sculpting, and they contend their individual aptitudes in the art form are comparable.


The Santa bodies are made of wood and have wire armssitting Santas also have wire legs that can be adjustedand those unseen wooden bodies are covered with clothes sewn from a variety of high-end fabrics.


Bassler and Wharton dont personally own any of the Santas theyve created.


Wharton, however, says that she falls in love with one or two a year. A time or two, she says, shes welled up with tears when a favorite has sold.


In the past, she hasnt been above putting a higher-than-usual price on one of her creations to keep it around longer. The first time that occurred, she says, was early on, before the two partners had formed Northwest Santa Creations. They made five high-end Santas and named them after different cities in IdahoStanley, Riggins, Bancroft, Chester, and Parker. (Naming one of the figures Santa, after the town of 150 people located about 70 miles south of Coeur dAlene, seemed too easy, Bassler says.)


Wharton says she grew fond of one of those fiveBancroftand put a $1,000 price tag on it in hopes that it wouldnt sell.


To her surprise, it was the first to go.


Bassler says that one of the reasons she believes the company has been successful is because it doesnt compromise on its pricing.


In the art field, weve never been afraid to ask the price we want, she says.