At Market Common, the New Year's Eve Ticket Is a Shopping Receipt
November 5, 2026
November 5, 2026
Buy a $25 gift at a shop on The Market Common's main grid between December 26 and 31, and you've paid for one person's ticket to Southern Times Square on New Year's Eve. Spend the same $25 at a storefront a few blocks south on Howard Avenue, and the management office will turn the receipt down.
Everyone uses one name for the whole area. The holiday calendar shows it covers two separate things. One is a privately run shopping and lifestyle center that plans, hosts and pays for most of December's festivities. The other is the much larger Market Common District, built on the former Myrtle Beach Air Force Base, where the parks belong to the City of Myrtle Beach and the farmers market is run by a cooperative. Once you know where the line falls, the season's fine print makes sense.
The center's own event page says the New Year's Eve celebration is "a privately-hosted event presented and underwritten by The Market Common shopping and lifestyle center." Tickets can't be bought and have no cash value. The only way in is to shop at the center. For the December 31, 2026 event, the steps are:
A family of four with a child over 2 needs $100 in qualifying receipts. Online orders count only if they come from a business located solely in the shopping center. The page also states the boundary directly: "Businesses located in SoHo or elsewhere in the Market Common District do not qualify." If you have questions before the 29th, the office number is (843) 839-3500.
So the free party works as a shopping incentive for one property. The center pays for the band, the ball drop and the drones, and the receipt requirement steers the last week of December's spending toward its own tenants.
The center makes the split clear itself. Its parks page lists Valor Memorial Garden, the park everyone calls Valor Park, and Grand Park, home to Savannah's Playground, and then adds a note that "the parks and facilities are owned and operated by the City of Myrtle Beach." To book a public event in those parks, you go through the city's Parks, Recreation & Sports Tourism Department, not the center. The same department runs Crabtree Memorial Gymnasium.
SoHo is the third piece. WPDE counted about a dozen more shops past the center's main stores. The station's reporting on the SoHo Shoppes placed them in live-work units south of Howard Avenue, outside the center's corporate management, with a homeowners association governing that section. In 2024 the station profiled You Eat I Bake, an allergy-friendly bakery at SoHo Shoppes. That's the kind of shop a New Year's Eve receipt can't come from, even though most visitors think of it as Market Common.
Here's who runs what this season:
Holiday activity | Where | Who runs it |
|---|---|---|
Saturday farmers market | Valor Park, 1120 Farrow Parkway | Waccamaw Market Cooperative, on city parkland |
Tree Lighting & Holiday Market | The Market Common | Shopping center |
Santa and pet photos with Santa | Grand 14 Plaza tree | Shopping center |
Carriage rides | Pickup at Dolce Lusso Spa & Salon, 3050 Howard Ave | Shopping center |
Breakfast with Santa | Tupelo Honey Cafe | Restaurant, on the center's calendar |
Crafts and Sensory Santa | EdVenture Children's Museum | EdVenture, on the center's calendar |
Southern Times Square NYE | Center of The Market Common | Shopping center, ticketed |
The longest-running item on the calendar isn't the shopping center's at all. The Market Common's own seasonal listing shows a Saturday market in Valor Park from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. that runs through December 19. The listing says Waccamaw Market Cooperative organizes it and that it "is not managed by The Market Common." The cooperative's 2025 vendor guidelines show the cooperative setting its own vendor and site-manager rules. That leaves seven Saturdays from November 7 through December 19, so holiday gifts from local vendors have a home here up until the week before Christmas.
The center's 2026 holiday page puts the Annual Tree Lighting & Holiday Market on the evening of Saturday, November 21. The night includes Santa's arrival, a holiday market, musical performances, a set from Coastal Dance Centre, and food and drinks for purchase. Check that page for the final start time before you go. Holiday carriage rides run that night from 5:45 to 8:45 p.m., with pickup and drop-off at Dolce Lusso Spa & Salon, 3050 Howard Avenue. It's also Valor Park market day, so you can shop the morning market and come back that evening for the lights.
Complimentary photos with Santa are scheduled at the Grand 14 Plaza tree throughout November and December. Pets get their own two nights, Wednesday, December 2 and Wednesday, December 16, from 5 to 7 p.m., in front of the decorated tree by Grand 14 Theater. Carriage rides return every Thursday and Sunday in December from 4 to 7 p.m., leaving from the same Howard Avenue pickup.
Tupelo Honey Cafe hosts Breakfast with Santa from 9 to 11 a.m. On Monday, December 21, EdVenture Children's Museum holds Children's Activities and Photos with Santa from 10 a.m. to noon, with holiday crafts and hands-on activities. EdVenture also hosts a Sensitive "Sensory" Santa night for children with sensory needs, with reduced lighting and noise, limited crowd size and quiet spaces. Registration details are on the event listing.
The center calls this "our biggest event of the year." It runs from 9 p.m. to midnight, with beer, wine and sparkling wine for purchase. Food trucks will sell popcorn, hot dogs, mac and cheese, tipsy pops and stuffed beignets. The children's corner offers complimentary face painting, snow cones and light-up toys. Julio & The Saltines headline, and the night ends with the ball drop.
The drone show is this year's addition. The page says the center has "brought back the Drone Show this year and added MORE Drones," and it advertises 300 drones counting down to 2027. The drones haven't always flown. In 2024, WPDE reported on December 27 that the planned drone show was canceled "due to unforeseen safety restrictions," while the music, vendors, children's activities and ball drop went ahead. A year later, WMBF's December 27, 2025 preview promoted a drone show billed as bigger than ever. If the drones are the reason you're going, check the center's page in the days just before the event. The crowd is a safer bet. WMBF's headline on January 1, 2025 read "Thousands celebrate New Year's Eve in The Market Common."
The ticket window opens the day after Christmas, so the receipt rule fits neatly into the week many people spend on returns, gift cards and dinners out. A family dinner on the 27th at a restaurant in the shopping center could cover everyone's tickets, as long as it all lands on one receipt that clears $25 per person. Taking that receipt to Deville Street on the 29th or 30th, during the 10-to-5 window, saves you from joining the December 31 line, when the office stays open until 9 p.m. and the party starts at the same hour.
The rest of the district is just as much a part of the season, even though it doesn't count toward a ticket. The Valor Park market's last Saturday is December 19. Grand Park and Savannah's Playground stay open for an afternoon outside between Santa visits. SoHo's storefronts at the south end of Howard Avenue are a short walk from the carriage pickup at Dolce Lusso.
I grew up watching Market Common grow out of the old base, and the holidays show best how its pieces fit together. If you're thinking about what it would be like to have the tree lighting, the Saturday market and that New Year's countdown within walking distance, Megan Parker would love to show you which streets put you closest to which part of the season. Let's Connect.
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