Jackson County residents can wrap up their Christmas shopping in a festive way Saturday in downtown Edna.
The Edna Business Association is presenting an Old Fashioned Christmas Market on Main Street from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Main Street will be closed to traffic by the square from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. Local businesses around the square will be open late for shoppers, and from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m., several food vendors will be set up, along with a visit from Santa Claus, bounce houses, a snow machine, kids’ crafts, and a cookie contest.
Cookie contest entries can be dropped off with the baker’s name and phone number at City Hall from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday, with judging by city council members.
The local merchants see this event as a fun way to kick off the holiday season, Sara Smiga, owner of All About Flowers and member of the Edna Business Association, said last week.
“Last year we had this, and it was a great success,” Smiga said. “We thought we would do it again.” Last year’s response has encouraged them about the interest in such an event locally, said Shelley Srp, Edna Business Association board member.
“It is a very traditional, small town Christmas market,” Srp said. “Since the street is closed, you have the freedom for you and your children to just stroll around with the Christmas feel and Santa and the excitement.”
Smiga agreed. “I feel like people in Edna want something to do,” Smiga said.
The event is hosted by the Merchant Committee of the Edna Business Association, with partners including the Friends of Edna, City of Edna, Trestleworks Services, Twin River Real Estate, Prosperity Bank, Realtor Lindsey Lee, Blessed Bull at the Ranch, Tiger Industrial Rentals, and OTM Services.
“(Twisted Caribou and Coastline owner) Amanda (Brand) did everything on her own last year,” Srp said. “We have stepped in to try and lighten her load. Last year was a huge success. We’re hoping this year will be just as successful, if not more.”
Brand, who is originally from Colorado, has a teenager who loves snow, which sparked the idea. “I wanted to bring a little piece of Colorado to Texas, so my goal was to get snow last year for our children,” Brand said. “My biggest goal was to increase revenue for our local merchants and for our vendors. So, I combined them both and prayed, and it really worked out wonderfully.
“It ‘snowed,’ the kids had a great time, we had hot chocolate, adults had egg nog, and the vendors did well,” Brand said. “Most vendors were able to make house payments. That was one of the comments. Another was that there was a merchant in town that was able to make the next rent. It’s comments like that that help us to keep going and support local.”
While shopping online can be convenient, it doesn’t provide other benefits that shopping with local businesses does, she said, particularly when it comes to sponsoring team and offering donations for children’s events such as the youth livestock show and fair.
“You forget, it’s us local people who support you on the Fair, because Amazon doesn’t support your Fair,” Brand said. “So it’s us that have to support local, or you have ghost towns. The whole objective of this is to get everybody to shop locally. We have a great crew. We just don’t have enough events.”
For many small businesses, the holiday sales in the fourth quarter make up a disproportionate amount of their revenue stream, making events such as the Old Fashioned Christmas Market crucial.
“In summer there’s literally no business, whatsoever,” Smiga said. “I do, because I do funerals, but for just a gift shop, there’s really no business. So this time of year really sustains us.”
Which, in turn, allows local merchants to support the community.
“I would like our community to know that we are here to support them,” Brand said. “We’re going to keep doing this as long as we’re able to. This isn’t something that’s going to disappear. That was not my goal when I started it.
“Our goal is to continue this on. I think it should be an Edna tradition.”
In years to come, timing the Old Fashioned Christmas Market with the city’s lighted Christmas parade would seem to make sense, they said, but there’s a slight hitch: timing it around possible football playoff games.
“For the city, it makes sense for them to do the parade on a Tuesday night so there’s no chance football will interrupt that,” Srp said. “But it’s not really easy to have a festival on a Tuesday night. So one of our goals moving forward is to try and figure out how we can make this like a two-day something.”
This season, playoff games have been either Thursday or Friday nights, Smiga noted, which gives them hope that this Saturday’s market won’t be competing with high school playoffs.
“Used to be, we played Saturdays in the playoffs,” Smiga said. “Thursdays are good because we can do things with the weekend.”
