Dec. 23—Goffstown resident Kelly Socia launched the New Hampshire Party Bus as a retirement startup.
People book the 16-seat coach for a wide range of reasons, from celebrations of birthdays, milestones and engagements.
“Last night it was a hockey moms’ night out,” Socia said recently.
But the holiday season brings out a whole new level of cheer.
It’s pretty hard not to smile when Santa, on breaks from North Pole duties, takes the wheel of the party bus wearing a different festive tie every night in December before Christmas.
Laughing as he admits to having a “tie issue,” Socia on social media has explained that he provides the jolly driver select pieces from his holiday-themed “Dollar Store Collection.”
There’s Santa jamming out on guitar with saxophone-playing elves, a polar bear flying down a snow-covered slope on a sled, penguins grinning in red stocking hats, and lots and lots of snowflakes, Christmas trees, wrapped gifts and ornaments along with Snoopy and the Grinch.
One eye-catching tie catches Santa and the reindeers zipping through the sky. It’s taken as if the team is coming right toward the viewer, making things in the foreground much larger than in the back. Rudolph, in the lead, is coming in strong, his huge red nose looming even larger than usual. His chin has forced the tie from its usual triangular tip into a rounded grin.
In a Christmas special kind of twist, Socia’s passion for quirky ties was made stronger years ago when he was reprimanded for wearing too loud a tie at work and told to tone it down. But the next day the order was rescinded and he’s been wearing and collecting more ties ever since.
He shares an image of a tie he picked up at Kohl’s on sale for $6.
“I’m a little whacked. I can do anything I want at 68,” he says, laughing.
The first year he put the party bus on the road, he was asked to take residents of an assisted care facility out on a Christmas-light tour.
The smiles alone made it worth the trip, he says.
Since then, he’s increased his social media presence, often posting on the Facebook pages for Light Up New Hampshire and Christmas Lights in Southern NH, where homeowners share photos of their own decorations and others ask about routes in specific portions of the Granite State.
The idea is to go through large neighborhoods, stopping 10 or so minutes at each display to let people get out and take pictures and then hop on the bus and go to the next section.
Recently he got a booking for a combination Christmas lights tour and 80th birthday celebration.
He also has a tip for people who still want to enjoy the holiday festivities when it’s not so frenetic — try the party bus between Christmas and New Year’s.
Signup bonus from
