Killarney’s Pub in Riverview will be hosting its first annual Christmas Market on Dec. 9 and 10 for people looking to do some gift shopping with a local flavour.
Killarney’s and Deja Brew owner Dominic Hickey said the goal of the market was partially to get Killarney’s a bit more exposure, while bringing the community together.
“We wanted to make it (Killarney’s) more of a community venue, because down in the neighborhood of Riverview, Killarney’s is the only thing down in that area,” Hickey said.
“We have come up with a lot of ideas to get people there to make use of the venue, and back in England we had a market seemingly every week in unusual venues like a bar … we thought we would try it and see if the public enjoyed it,”
“We measured out how many vendors we thought we could get through, and we’re just over the 20 mark. We have 22 vendors and we actually had to turn away another dozen, just because we didn’t have the space.”
While Hickey is excited for the market to take place, he said there have been some challenges that have come with trying to organize the event.
“Dealing with Alberta Gaming and Liquor Commission (AGLC), in simple terms, they didn’t really want us having the market because we’re a licensed premises, even though we are licensed to allow children as well,” Hickey said.
“I dug my heels in and basically told them we were going to do it and they’d have to find a way around it. The end result is they persisted we have an area of the restaurant that’s just for liquor and food … so for anyone who just wants to come in and eat, we only have about 36 seats available down at the far end of the restaurant.
“The idea of the market is for people to literally just wander around all the different vendors.”
Hickey also said that there are a good variety of vendors at the market place.
“We have someone who makes jewelry, someone that does makeup, someone that makes clothing, we have another that does painted glass for Christmas decorations and artists, so we have a good number of people who have different skills available,” Hickey said.
“Most of the vendors are from Cochrane, which is good because we are trying to keep it as local as possible … we also have a few people from Calgary as well. We have a real mixture of craft making people, who are physically making something themselves, and then we have people with the product type thing as well.
“We at Killarney’s are really excited to see how it all turns out.”
For more information on the market night, you can visit the Cochrane Craft Market or Killarney’s Family Pub on Facebook or Dejabrew Cochrane on Instagram.
