These Edmonton companies have created advent calendars for adults

Advent calendars used to be associated with childhood, opening a little door every day and receiving a chocolate, but that’s no longer the case.

Advent calendars for adults have caught on in a huge way over the last decade, and some local companies have gotten into the game.

SYC Brewing in west Edmonton has been making a beer advent calendar since itopened itsdoors in 2019.

“We’ve done this a couple of years now ever since we’ve opened, and it’s been massively successful,” said Adrian Boudreau of SYC Brewing.

“We all deserve to have a little fun. I don’t think advent calendars are just strictly for kids and I think adults have more of a whimsical sense of humour that we give us credit for.”

The calendar includes 24 different beers, some brewed exclusively for the occasion.

The brewery picks a different theme for each year’s calendar.

“This year’s theme is crossword puzzle, so all the cans are numbered, one to 24, but you don’t know what’s in each can,” he said.

The SYC Brewing beer advent calendar.

“We do release a hint to what is in each can every morning around 9 a.m. It’s going to be posted on Instagram and our website.”

The name of the beer and where to buy it will be revealed by solving the hint.

“It gets people excited about trying new beers, it gets them more engaged in trying new beers they might not have tried before just based on the label or the logo.”

The calendars retail for $120, and while they’re all sold out online, Boudreau says there are still a few available for in-person purchase at the brewery.

“We’ve been extraordinarily successful this year, it’s been amazing the support we’ve gotten from Edmontonians, from abroad Edmonton as well, and we believe it’s going to be even better next year.”

It’s a different story at Alberta-based Hingston and Olsen Publishing.

The two-person company created a literary advent calendar in 2015.

“We founded the company to make the short story advent calendar, it was the first thing we ever made, and it’s become our flagship title, so we’ve made one every single year since then,” said Michael Hingston.

“There are 25 booklets, you get one for every day of the month, starting Dec. 1 all the way up to Christmas Day.”

The Short Story Advent Calendar.

Each story is about 2,000 to 7,000 words long and takes anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour to read.

“I think what really appeals about the advent calendar as a format is just daily ritual, so it’s having something to look forward to where you do something every day, and I also think the variety is a big part of it.”

While Hingston says they don’t like to give away too many of the authors, this year’s calendar includes stories from Venita Blackburn, Lucy Ellmann and Steven Millhauser.

“Variety is always the name of the game.”

The company also added a kid’s advent calendar last year, which included stories from Jerry Spinelli and Beatrix Potter.

“We just kept hearing from kids who saw their parents doing it and said, ‘Like why don’t we have one?’ So it took us a while to get around to it, but we’re really happy with how it turned out,” Hingston said.

The stories in the kids calendar are shorter than the ones in the adult calendar, and are aimed at kids approximately age nine and up.

The Kid's Short Story Advent Calendar.

“Kids writers don’t often write at that length, so a lot of the stories in the kids calendar are original, written specifically for us.”

The adult calendar costs $65, and the kids calendar is $70.

They can be purchased online, or at local bookstores, including Audrey’s, Glass Bookshop, The Prints and the Paper, and Tix on the Square. 

With files from CTV News Edmonton's Jessica Robb.