Every year I get excited about what over the top advent Calender I’m going to buy but then I end up not buying anything because I’m either a) disappointed with the selection or b) way too cheap to spend $200 bucks on an advent calendar. In the UK there seems to be an infinite selection of advent calendars in all sorts of styles and price ranges, whereas here in Canada unless you put some work into obtaining it, it’s mostly just chocolate. There is definitely more selection of chocolate then there was when I was a kid (now there are Reeses, Kinder, Smarties, Lindor etc.) and thank god for that because 99 cent advent calendar chocolate tastes like chocolate flavoured candle wax! But here I have collected 24 next level advent calenders that you can actually walk into a store and buy in Canada in 2018.
I’d love to hear what advent calendar(s) you got this year! Also, I’d love to know if you are one of those people who just opens the whole calendar all at once because if so you have a chaotic energy and I’m low key always going to be wondering if you would kill me if you had the chance.
Anyway, here are over 25 advent calendars (no waxy chocolate in sight!) that you can actually get this year. All prices are in Canadian dollars!
David’s Tea
I absolutely love David’s Tea and always buy something there around Christmas time. David’s is a Canadian company but has some stores in the Northern US as well! They are actually doing three advent calendars this year instead of just their usual one. Here are some pictures of the beautiful calendar I picked up which is 25 bedtime teas! Look at those cute hedgehogs inside! This calendar is $25 which feels more than reasonable based on the size and quality of it.
In the past, I’ve gotten the full sized David’s tea calendar which is an amazing value (at least two cups of tea per day!) at $49 but it’s honestly more tea than I can drink? I like that they are offering this smaller (and cheaper) version that is just 25 tea bags instead of 25 full tins of tea. There is also the THIRD calender that is similar to mine but with organic (and caffeinated maybe?) teas.
L’OCCITANE
This year Mum got the L’OCCITANE signature advent calendar. She made a good point that a lot of the beauty advent calendars try to pad their days with things like mirrors and applicators whereas the L’OCCITANE advent is 100% product. According to the website, you get $116 of product for $59 ($2.45 per day) which is a really phenomenal deal. They also have a larger luxury version that costs $134 ($5.58 per day) and has $153 worth of product.
Shoppers
Shoppers Drug Mart is where you buy Advil when you have a headache in the middle of your commute, but they also do two beauty calendars (I really wish they would strike a deal to sell some of the UK ones over here!) one is Quo, their house brand, and the other is the Artdeco calendar which is a German makeup brand. The Artdeco calender has 24 products that look pretty large (one is a sharpener but the rest seem to be products) for $89 ($3.70 per day), whereas the Quo one has 12 products for $40 ($3.33 per day) and three of those are applicators. I was going to buy the Quo one but when I saw it in person it was super small. I think I’ll try to nab it for 50% off on Boxing day if there are any left!
Squish
Are you more of a Candy than a chocolate person? If so Canadian company Squish has what you need! The cool thing about Squish is that on top of their normal advent calendar they have a vegan gummy advent calendar which, if you’ve ever been a vegan ( I pulled it off for exactly a year before giving up on day 366) you know that it’s really hard to find holiday products that are vegan-friendly! Also, these candies aren’t just like strawberry and orange, they are a whole bunch of different unique flavours!
Chocolate
Okay, I am going to include just a few chocolate ones. First of all, my favourite chocolate bar is just a plain old Dairy Milk. I honestly wish I could just have a dairy milk and a cup of coffee for breakfast every day. But I won’t …. but I WILL have a small piece of Dairy Milk and a coffee every morning in December. You can get this advent pretty much anywhere for about $9.99 which in my opinion is worth it to just have good chocolate.
There are some other worthy chocolate calendars beyond just your classic Dairy Milk. I’m still thinking about picking up one of these two calendars from Purdy’s which are legit so beautiful. You can get the larger house shaped one with solid chocolate for $28 or the more traditional (but still super cute) flat calendar for $20.Â
The Lindor calenders are also a solid bet and are worth a shout out. There are three of them and they don’t list the prices on the Canadian website but they seem to be between 12 and 25 dollars. Plus if you go into a physical Lindor store they always give you a free chocolate when you walk if you buy something or not in which like is pretty amazing tbh.
The Bay
If there is one place in Canada that is just over the top Christmas it is The Bay. I walked around the Eatons Center Bay last week and it is just like 5 floors of Christmas. ESPECIALLY the basement, don’t skip the basement. I didn’t realize until then that the Bay actually does two advent calendars as well. They do this one chocolate one that plays GD music! It is the sort of thing you buy once and then fill up yourself the following years so it’s kind of an investment at $49. There is also a cheaper one for $19.99 that just feels boring in comparison once you’ve seen the music house.
Nails and Beauty
Sephora Canada has their own calendar that, as reviewers point out, would be good for someone younger or who are just starting with makeup but isn’t worth it if you take your makeup routine very seriously WHICH I DO. It’s about 3 bucks per product for 12 products, but it looks like at least two of those days are the type of applicators that come with eyeshadow that you toss in favour of a real brush. They also have this 12 days of makeup calendar for $108 (approx $5 per product) that has brands that appeal to me, but according to the reviews, the products are really really small. You can also buy the well-reviewed CIATÉ LONDON Mini Mani Month Nail Set which comes with 24 products for $70 (about 2.91 per day) which, honestly, for polishes of this quality seems more than worth it. There is also the Essie polish calender which is $39.99 for 12 products (about 3.33 each) which also seems like a great deal and you can get it at Walmart. If only I didn’t absolutely hate painting my nails.
The Body Shop goes ALL out when it comes to Advent (with 25 days instead of 24) which I guess shouldn’t be a surprise since they are British. They have three calendars, and it is basically a life goal for me to have one of these massive ones, but like my apartment is too small rn. The biggest one is $169 for 25 products (approx 6.75 a day) but a LOT of the days have very large products. Like I think I would struggle to use all this over the course of a year! The medium one is $99 for 25 products (approx $4 per product) keep in mind that one of those is a nail file so not every day will be a winner. The smallest one is sold out so I don’t know details about it but in the past, I think it’s 24 days and around $69.
Weed?
Now, if you don’t like the looks of anything else on this list, maybe you will be interested in the most uniquely Canadian calendar on this list which contains 24 days of weed. You heard me right. It is legal here so don’t @ me. I’ll admit that unlike the others on this list you can’t just walk into a store at the mall and buy this one but I felt like I had to include it none the less. Honestly, this calendar, is surprisingly really classy looking? It costs $220 (which is just over 9 bucks a day) which is a lot but each day boasts a unique strain for you to sample. Honestly, this is probably just a really good way to figure out what you do and don’t like and have a much more interesting December than most of us lol.
There you go 25 advent calendars! What did I miss? What kind of Advent calendars do you wish you could get in Canada?
-Emma ❤
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