Organizers of new Christmas Market surprised by turnout
A group dedicated to drawing summer tourists to the Lake Erie shoreline branched out into a colder holiday season this weekend.
Explore the Shore hosted its first Christmas Market at the Colchester Community Room on Saturday. More than a dozen vendors from the local community sold their wares to a crowd so large it surprised organizers.
“I couldn’t believe it,” said Carol Quick, who spearheaded the market’s creation. “Twenty minutes before we opened we already had a line of people from out of town at the door asking to come in.” One-of-a-kind jewelry, knitwear, coffee, ornaments, baked goods and more awaited the eager shoppers inside.
“We’ve got a lot of hard workers here that are willing to all put something into it to help,” said Quick, who sold soy candles from her Quick’s Wicks table. “This is a great setting for everybody to be able to come together and bring everybody out.”
Many vendors work from home further inland and aren’t allowed to participate in Explore the Shore’s July weekend, which is limited to businesses located in the immediate area of Essex County Road 50, said Leslie Balsillie, chair of the Explore the Shore committee. She wanted to create an event to include everyone for the holidays.
“Explore the Shore is so successful that we can hardly make that weekend any bigger,” said Balsillie. “We are all swamped, which is awesome. That’s the goal of it.” The organizers couldn’t do much more to improve or expand the summer event, Balsillie said, so they decided to do something else, and created the Christmas market. “This is to keep that excitement going, invite people back, and highlight the businesses that are open year round,” Balsillie said. With eyes on the future, Quick said she and other organizers are already planning an expanded event next year, hoping to fill Christ Church, an Explore the Shore destination just one block away, with more vendors, in addition to the community centre location.
“It brings people out to the lake, along the shore, in both summer and winter now,” said Quick. “People have just jumped on board.”