The Nose Creek Valley Museum is gearing up to host a car boot sale and flea market on July 23 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., offering Airdrie residents the opportunity to peruse a variety of locally made products or gently used household goods.
Located within the Airdrie-based museum’s parking lot, the car boot sale will see vendors occupying parking stalls and using the trunks of their cars, (and an additional table if desired) to display their goods for purchase.
“We did some research on car boot sales because they’re not really popular in Canada [but] they’re popular in Australia and the United Kingdom,” explained Laurie Harvey, the executive director of the Nose Creek Valley Museum.
She mentioned how the museum’s board loved the idea of the internationally-inspired market.
“It’s just a flea market from your car,” she added.
The goal of the market is to generate funds for the museum that will cover operational costs, like utilities, which have risen with recent inflation.
The funds will be helpful, according to Harvey, as the museum spent more days closed than open in the past two years, due to the restrictions implemented by the Alberta government throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It’s been a hard couple of years,” she said.
The museum receives most of its revenue from renting its meeting rooms, but throughout the pandemic, the meeting rooms were not available for rent, meaning the museum has had little revenue in the past two years.
“We’re playing catch up a little,” Harvey said.
Since the COVID-19 restrictions have been lifted, Harvey has seen more groups beginning to rent these rooms again, using them for community group meetings as well as birthday parties.
The car boot sale and flea market should help give the museum a financial boost while providing the community’s entrepreneurs and artisans with an opportunity to generate some disposable income as well.
“Our goal for our community is to give people a place to sell their things or buy things from people who may not have a garage or [they] live in an apartment,” Harvey said, explaining how the museum’s large parking lot allows for space that many Airdronians may not have.
The museum parking lot can accommodate 50 cars and there is some limited indoor table space available as well. Registration will remain open until all spots are filled. As of press time, there was still plenty of available parking spots.
The fee for a parking spot is $15. For a vendor with their own table, it is $20 to reserve an indoor selling space when using their own table and $25 for an indoor space with a museum-provided table.
To book a parking stall or indoor space, interested Airdrie residents can call the museum at 403-948-6685 or send an email to [email protected]. They can also fill out an online registration form at bit.ly/3P9Q8Rd
The rain-or-shine event invites residents to sell nearly anything “that is safe, legal, and that belongs to them,” according to Harvey, although there is a short list of items that cannot be sold, including weapons, live animals, and counterfeit goods.
Although this is the first car boot sale hosted by Nose Creek Valley Museum, Harvey said they plan on hosting more in the future. In fact, the museum has two additional, tentative dates scheduled for later this summer, depending on the success and turnout of the first market.
The museum will remain open during the market and admission to the historical site is by monetary donation.
