Looking for Christmas festival ideas to help bring together the best retailers, food and drink vendors, and entertainment in your community?
If you’re ready to plan a Christmas festival in your area, the first step is to consider your audience and the attractions they’d love.
Let’s dive into some of the best Christmas event ideas for your community.
Christmas festival ideas
Hosting a Christmas festival in your community brings people together to participate in holiday-themed activities, view twinkling light displays, and make memories.
Small-town Christmas event ideas can also be profitable for local businesses, such as merchants selling gifts or food trucks serving food and beverages.
Christmas festival activities
Wherever you hold your Christmas festival, activities like the below will create interest and keep attendees entertained. Consider your unique space and location, and how attendees will move between activities.
Here are some Christmas festival ideas for all ages:
- Photos with Santa – design a backdrop for pictures with Santa; offer an option to print photos or send digital copies to guests
- Gingerbread house workshops – hold a demonstration with a local baker or let guests decorate their own gingerbread house
- Christmas decoration workshops – host a workshop led by an expert to help guests craft homemade holiday décor
- Carol singing – gather members of the community to perform at your event
- Christmas stalls – invite local retailers to set up stalls selling their boutique Christmas goods
- Christmas competitions – from Spot the Santa to prizes for the best dressed, a competition is a fun way to keep people engaged
- Floral decoration workshops – recruit a local florist to teach guests how to design a Christmas wreath or centrepiece
- Christmas card making – set up a Christmas card-making station stocked with paper, markers, scissors, glue and other craft supplies
- Family photo sessions – offer mini sessions with a local photographer
Hold a Christmas market
A list of Christmas festival ideas wouldn’t be complete without a guide to Christmas markets.
Christmas markets are an excellent opportunity to transform an indoor or outdoor space with food, drinks, entertainment, and booths where locals can sell goods. This can be a one-day event or last for a week. Or, open it every weekend in December leading up to Christmas. If you anticipate large crowds, a multi-day market is best to extend the event’s reach.
Where to hold your Christmas market
Finding the right location for your Christmas market depends on various factors, including how many people you expect to attend. Consider your typical weather during December to decide if an indoor or outdoor event is appropriate.
Here are some indoor and outdoor options for a Christmas market:
- At a town hall – community buildings are usually conveniently located; just make sure to check the capacity
- In a church – some churches offer their gathering spaces for a reasonable price
- A street party – weather permitting, close off a street in the town centre
- An oval – transform this local green space into a Christmas market
- School gardens – usually, schools are big enough to host good numbers and may be willing to host a Christmas fete
Food and beverages at Christmas events
Christmas food often celebrates decadence. Have a variety of food stalls to cater to different dietary considerations and showcase your finest local produce.
Ask local artisans and food producers to sell traditional holiday fare for guests to enjoy onsite, as well as favourites to go – mince pies, sausage rolls, and mulled wine are always winners. Or, if you want to opt for a traditional market, consider a theme like a German Christmas market, with beer and sausages.
Look to your community when reaching out to food vendors; they may already be familiar to attendees. Vendors will have the opportunity to introduce their food to hungry guests, and you’ll demonstrate your support of local businesses.
Shopping for local Christmas events
Include shopping stalls for browsing gifts at your Christmas festival – combining a festive activity with productive holiday shopping is a win for attendees.
Consider your audience when choosing the types of vendors. A local vendors-only event creates a community-oriented experience. Or focus your festival on sustainable shopping practices. If you want to target a craftier crowd interested in artisanal goods, promote your Christmas market as a local crafts fair.
Christmas event ideas – community considerations
When hosting a community Christmas event, you want to include everyone. Have a wide variety of options for all community members to enjoy.
Get everyone involved by reaching out to local artists, food artisans, and musicians to make your Christmas event extra special and inclusive. Invite choirs, bands, and orchestras to perform Christmas classics for their family and neighbours. Why not consider linking up with schools to see if they’d like to perform or participate?
For your community Christmas event, include entertainment such as:
- Local bands, high school orchestras, or choirs
- A nativity scene featuring actors and live animals
- Roving entertainers bringing cheer and Christmas spirit
- Carol singers showcasing holiday favourites
Tips for making your Christmas festival a success
Whilst planning all of your exciting Christmas festival ideas, it’s important to note a few safety and practical considerations.
Plan for the weather
Christmas markets are often in outdoor spaces, so prepare for different types of weather, especially extreme heat in summer. Consider water coolers, tents, and umbrellas to keep people cool.
Establish your communication plan with vendors and attendees in case you need to postpone or relocate your market because of bad weather.
Keep your attendees safe
When planning an event, keep all local regulations and restrictions in mind, such as applicable mandates or vaccination requirements. Be sure to have a process to check IDs if alcohol will be sold or served. Hand stamps or wristbands can help identify attendees over 18.
Create standout marketing for your audience
During the summer holidays, you’ll be competing for attendees with other seasonal events, so create a promotional plan highlighting your unique selling points (USP). Offer discounts for early-bird ticket buyers or special discounts on vendor wares for attendees who buy their tickets before the event. And be sure to check out these holiday marketing tips from the experts at Eventbrite Boost.
Even if your event is free, you must grab your audience’s attention. Create a catchy hashtag and encourage attendees to post pictures on social media during the event. Remember to capture photos and videos you can use as collateral for marketing next year’s event.
Find the best partners and sponsors for your event
When seeking vendors, partners, and sponsors, reflect on your brand or organisation’s values. If your event focuses on sustainability, ensure your vendors are conscious of ethical and low-waste manufacturing processes.
Not sure where to begin? Create a wish list of the organisations you’d love to work with. Then, narrow down your list to the organisations that appeal to your audience and align with your vision.
Give your Christmas fair a charitable component
Plan a Christmas market that lets you give back to the community. If attendees are paying for tickets, donate some of the proceeds to an organisation whose mission connects with your brand. Discuss with your vendors and partners the possibility of making a charitable donation.
If you’re partnering with nonprofit organisations, offer a free booth or table at the Christmas market where they can distribute information about their mission and accept extra donations.
Fight For Something’s advice for an unforgettable Christmas event
The co-founders of Fight For Something, Mitch Reaume and Becky Sturm, are two entrepreneurs who started the Minnesota Christmas Market six years ago with charitable goals in mind.
“First, we wanted to create wins for the small business community here in Minnesota and make it easy for customers to shop local for the holidays,” says Reaume. “Second, we wanted to create an event that would fight for kids and see business used for good here in the Twin Cities.”
Their annual event is a pop-up holiday market that showcases local brands and makers. All vendors donate 7% of their sales to a local charity that fights for kids in the Twin Cities. That means the Fight for Something Christmas Market supports local businesses while offering “an opportunity for people to make a positive impact, not only in their local economy but also in some of [the] state’s most important nonprofits that are fighting for kids”.
Though the event began in a single location with only a few hundred guests, it has now grown to a multi-date, multi-location undertaking, expected to draw over 20,000 attendees annually. The market incorporates food, shopping, drinks and local music. “Over the years we’ve gotten to know some of the hardest-working and most loved small businesses in the state,” Reaume says. “We bring them all together under one roof during the holiday season for the best possible local pop-up market you can find.”
Reaume has some advice for other creators planning a similar event – think about what means the most to them. “You’ve got to care about why you’re doing it. Becky and I work well together because she is more committed to supporting local businesses than anyone I know, and I carry a similar conviction around wanting to see businesses used to do good. We work great together because we actually believe in what we’re building and think that’s important.”
Ready to host your Christmas festival?
If you’ve already planned your Christmas market event and your vendors are ready, post your event for free online and promote it in Eventbrite’s marketplace.
Need help promoting your event using email and social media? We’re here to help. Eventbrite Boost makes it easy to build your brand and sell more tickets to your Christmas festival.
