Throughout the county: Locals promote shopping small

Jana Mathia, Gazette Reporter | Nov 16, 20170

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shop local

Shoppers take advantage of Endicott’s Shop Local event at the Endicott Food Center on Saturday. Other communities will host their own similar events to encourage holiday shoppers to patronize small, local businesses. This Saturday, Nov. 25, is national Shop Small day.

With holiday shopping in the air and the mayhem of Black Friday shopping after Thanksgiving just around the corner, area businesses are banding together to remind consumers to shop local first.

“In rural America, it’s so, so important you support your local businesses,” said Amanda Webb of St. John. Webb is part of a group that pitched in to mail out 2,000 flyers to residents to remind them of community events and to shop local.

“If you can get it in your town, you need to be getting it there,” she said.

Among the events the flyer lists is Small Business Saturday. Also known as Shop Small Saturday, it is a movement begun in 2010 by American Express to help businesses hurting from the recession, hoping to bring more holiday shopping to small businesses.

Webb cited the statistic that for every $100 spent at a local business, $68 is returned to the community. When that same amount is spent online or in a big box store like WalMart, next to nothing comes back to the community.

“It’s kind of a shift in thinking,” Webb said. “Can you get that locally?”

Webb pointed out that a lot of people have family visiting for Thanksgiving and that weekend, and instead of the Black Friday madness, locals can take their families to their neighborhood businesses.

“It’s a great opportunity to show off what we’ve got going,” she said.

Shopping local means more than just the store fronts; it means also buying from friends with in-home businesses and direct sales.

“You’re supporting that person and their family,” said Webb, who is also a Mary Kay consultant. “Would you rather buy mascara from a girlfriend or WalMart?”

The flyer sent out was called ‘Love where you Live.’ It was sponsored by mostly St. John businesses, but they really had a broader view, Webb said. If someone from Steptoe shops in St. John, great; but it is still a huge win if they shop in Colfax or Endicott, she added.

On Nov. 9 St. John businesses held a Girls’ Night Out which had eight buildings open for special shopping geared toward women. Some of the buildings held multiple businesses and shopping opportunities.

“It was a fun opportunity to showcase other business that don’t have brick and mortar,” Webb said.

Small Business Saturday keeps in that same vein of focusing on how the community can benefit from local dollars going to local businesses which pay taxes on local needs like schools and roads. St. John business owners are so dedicated to supporting the shop local movement, many plan to be open the Saturday after Thanksgiving and some that will be out of town are making arrangements for someone else to operate the store that day.

Businesses wanting to participate in Small Business Saturday can go to http://www.shopsmall.com to download free customizable marketing materials.