The Miller family: Alaska Business Hall of Fame Laureates, JA: Santa Claus House of North Pole.

• Author: Liles, Patricia
• Position: Santa Claus House - Cover Story

Borrowing $300 for seed money in 1952, Con and Nellie Miller opened a general store in the budding community of North Pole, a business that has grown to become a well-known, highly visible community icon.

Today, the internationally known Santa Claus House is run by the couple's children, with assistance from grandchildren and even great-grandchildren.

"The third generation of the family is very involved in the organization, and we have some of their kids running around stocking shelves and helping out," said Mike Miller, president of the family owned corporation. "We beat the odds, for most family owned businesses collapse at or after the second generation."

He attributes the family's business success in part to the unique product offered by the Santa Claus House. Providing gifts and colorful, personalized letters from Santa, complete with an authentic North Pole, Alaska, postmark, cannot be duplicated or moved to a different location.

The family owned business also has grown through the years, evolving significantly with changes in local traffic, needs and technology. Today, the Santa Claus House maintains a strong Internet presence, a growing market that nearly doubles each year, Miller said. And recent upgrades in shipping services and the U.S. Postal Service allows for a longer time frame to accommodate last-minute Christmas shoppers from the far North retail location.

The Santa Claus House has grown significantly since Con and Nellie first moved to Alaska and set up shop, initially a clothing store in Fairbanks in 1950. To supplement business, Con traveled throughout the Interior, taking needed items to sell in rural communities.

The traveling salesman often wore a crushed velvet Santa Claus suit, part of the stock the couple brought north to Alaska from a previous business. As Con and Nellie began to develop plans to build a general store in the North Pole community in 1952, clients from Northway asked Con if he was building a house for Santa Claus.

The name stuck, even if the initial business offered little in the way of Christmas gifts. Con's and Nellie's business provided groceries and basic necessities for the residents of North Pole, located about 10 miles from Fairbanks on the Richardson Highway and in the middle of two major military installations. A soda fountain provided locals with a gathering spot and a job for the couple's children, Miller said.

The transient nature of the Fairbanks area back then sometimes made it...