Mercadito Fest

Are you a small business owner in the Eden Area and want to vend at Mercadito Fest?

Key information for vendors:

• Priority will be given to business owners who live in the Eden Area: Ashland, Cherryland, Castro Valley, Fairview, Hayward Acres, and San Lorenzo. 
• We will only reach out to you if you have been selected for the Mercadito Fest.
  • We select vendors based on the type of products they sell. Our venue is small and we only accommodate about a dozen food and artisanal vendors.
  • For the best vendor experience and to avoid repetition, we try to only select one of each vendor type, (i.e. only one taco vendor, one candle vendor, one candy vendor, etc.)
• All vendors must pay a fee to sell at Mercadito Fest. Those funds go directly back into the administration and marketing of the event. 
• If you are not selected we will keep your information on file and reach out if any other opportunities to sell at Mercadito Fest arise.

Reach out to gladys@myedenvoice.org with Mercadito Fest related questions.

All vendors, regardless of their participation in Mercadito Fest, are welcome to become a part of the Sanctuary Business Network.

When Diana, owner of Yoyo’s Botaneria, opened up her store in Cherryland in 2025, she knew she wanted to bring the night markets and community plazas she grew up with in Mexico to the Eden Area. That same year, Diana became an MEV member, sharing the same enthusiasm to drive investments and representation to the Eden Area that MEV fights for.

Her business, Yoyo’s Botaneria is also part of the Sanctuary Business Network, pledging to protect her business and the community in the face of immigration enforcement.

One year later, My Eden Voice and Diana launched the Mercadito Fest. Now, Mercadito Fest proudly provides vending opportunities to community organizations, artisanal and food vendors from the Eden Area and neighboring cities. Without its own formal downtown, Mercadito Fest offers Eden Area residents a rare opportunity for community to rally together, celebrate the Eden Area and shop from local small businesses.

All Mercadito Fest vendors are proudly a part of the Sanctuary Business Network.

Here at My Eden Voice we envision a future where Eden Area residents can thrive without barriers. Mercadito Fest began because we noticed there were no other night markets like it. The Eden Area has been historically underfunded and underinvested in, forcing residents of the area to go to neighboring cities to enjoy food, nightlife and family fun. Mercadito Fest quickly became a community hub and one of the few opportunities vendors have to sell their products locally, in their own community. 

At MEV we believe in not only creating opportunities but also removing barriers. In our quest to create Mercadito Fest, we discovered a number of broken systems that make it difficult for small business owners to get off the ground, let alone thrive, including:

• Expensive single day use permits and licenses that create economic barriers
• Long and difficult to navigate permitting processes 
• Long and unpredictable approval wait times for permits
• Requirement of commercial kitchen which is not available at all in the Unincorporated Area, forcing food vendors to go to neighboring cities

The county’s current system makes it extremely difficult for food vendors in the Eden Area to comply with their standards and sell the “right way.” We believe that local entrepreneurs should have accessible pathways to compliance. We advocate for systems that support, rather than discourage, small business participation in the Eden Area.