On Sunday, Dec. 10 from noon to 6 p.m., Hey Bear Cafe located off of Middlebrook Pike is hosting its third annual Christmas artisan market for local Knoxvillian vendors. Goods being sold range from local eats to jewelry and tapestries made by local vendors.

As seen in recent months with Ijams and other community centers like it hosting similar events, it seems that Knoxville and the greater county have begun to prioritize goods and services made in-house, rather than a large chain with no real investment in the community.

For Hey Bear Cafe, a relatively new addition to Knoxville’s expanding cafe group, the holiday market is just one of many instances in which it tries to highlight the good work being done by its neighbors. It has had local markets over the summer and on Tennessee game days and even hosted a slew of live bands from local performers in the area.

Sarah Stratton, a shift lead, said that a sense of community is one of the store’s main focuses in a lot of aspects.

“We really like getting local business owners and local craftspeople to come just because it’s nicer than everything coming from a big corporation,” Stratton said. “It’s all very local. Your neighbors come together and make it. I really think people like buying things from the city they live in and from someone they might know, too. There’s a lot more care put into it a lot of the time.”

Hey Bear Cafe’s owner Vicky Shyr is a previous vendor herself, first having a pop-up outside of Sunrise Market. After years of connecting with and participating in local markets with others around town, she was finally blessed enough to open her own brick-and-mortar space. When this happened, she felt it only natural that she return the favor of support to those who helped her and Hey Bear Cafe get to where they are today.

Jasmine Bowers is the Hey Bear Cafe store manager and spoke on the introduction of pop-up markets to Hey Bear Cafe.

“She wanted all the pop-ups that she knew to have a place to go because she knew she was very fortunate to have that,” Bowers said. “It helped her a lot, and she wanted to provide that opportunity to get your name out there with the advantage she had.”

While most of Hey Bear’s vendors are now regular guests in its backyard, there is still a vetting process to be followed by those who wish to display their hard work for customers to see. They only accept small or local businesses, and while they don’t need to originate directly from Knoxville, those stores and sellers are usually highly prioritized.

Multi-level marketing, resellers and big brands are all firmly on the “no-go” list when it comes to their markets. Everything at these events is relatively locally made, and products are sold by the hands that crafted them.

Santa Claus himself, in the form of Knoxville’s own “865Santa,” is a past guest of Hey Bear Cafe’s holiday artisan market and is said to be making an appearance off of Kingston Pike this Sunday. While he brings his own materials for setup, parents are more than welcome to take photographs with him completely free of charge.

Whether you’re looking for some fun and local food to distract you from exams or need a place to find thoughtful and unique gifts for friends and family, Hey Bear Cafe promises to bring the community together with its holiday market. Don’t worry if you can’t make this one, though — one glance at their schedule will tell you that this is a place that likes to stay busy and help their neighbors do the same.