Holiday Shopping: Think Local
You’re sitting in your easy chair sipping on some tea while quietly reading a magazine. You can hear the sound of soft singing coming from the kitchen.
As you flip a page in your magazine, you start to recognize the familiar song of Jingle Bells. You begin to feel your tie wrapping around your neck. You grab hold of the chair to regain some composure - it is too late. Blood hurdling cries can be heard in the background.
Without fail, the holidays creep up on us every year. Even though we have a year to prepare and ample time to think about gifts for friends and families, we all use time as an excuse for not getting our shopping done earlier. As a result, we resort to easy, fast solutions to help save time and money. One such heavily relied upon solution has become the Internet.
Shop local
When you shop on the Web, you are forgetting about a very valuable part of your community - local businesses. Local businesses are the staple of your community. They help drive the economy, ease strains on the environment and bring diversity and character to you and your neighbors.
You have the choice of where you want to shop. Local shops are not the answer to all your needs and wants, but they definitely should not be overlooked in your hunt for the perfect gifts this holiday season.
Nine benefits to shopping locally:
1. Local dollars help local economy. The dollars spent in your locally-owned businesses have more impact on your community as a whole than the dollars spent outside of your city. Each dollar you spend locally goes to improve the economic situation of your community. Local money creates local jobs and in some cases can help improve local wages and benefits. Through paying local taxes, you also help fund neighborhood, community and city projects.
2. Local stores offer unique gifts. If you shop in nationally-known or chain stores, you will find the same gifts over and over again. You will be amazed at the unusual treasures you can find in local stores. The benefits of finding a one-of-a-kind gift for that special someone in your life are endless. Just to name a few - the gift looks more thoughtful, the likelihood of gift duplication is lowered and no one knows how much you spent on the present.
3. Local stores add local charm. Local stores are what set your town apart from others on the map. They each have a special flavor to add to your community that cannot be duplicated anywhere else in the world. This keeps the culture and character of your town.
4. Local stores are like family. Over time you develop more personal relationships with local merchants. You see them throughout your community and get to know them like family. You also have more opportunity of running into your friends when you shop locally.
5. Local shopping is better for the environment. Local stores are closer to home. You can walk, run and bike to a store. This saves on the expensive cost of upkeep for your vehicles. And, even if you do decide to drive, a local store 2 miles down the road in your community is a lot closer than the mall that is 25 miles away in a neighboring town. However, there are always exceptions and you may be the lucky person with a mall in your backyard.
6. Local stores are few and far between. Corporations, chain stores and malls force local stores to go out of business every day. Consumers are often drawn to the chain stores in search of a bargain or to meet more needs and desires in one location. The more money pushed towards these BIG businesses leaves smaller, local businesses struggling to keep up.
7. Local merchants have local interest. Local merchants care about your community. They invest in the schools, buy ads in the local papers and support community projects. Local merchants pay taxes and contribute to local causes. They also have local ownership in important decisions that could affect your community.
8. Local businesses encourage entrepreneurship. In a tough economy, people are not as willing to take risks. Watching successful local businesses succeed encourages other citizens to take chances, innovate and create.
9. Local competition keeps prices low. Competition is definitely beneficial to the local consumer. This keeps prices affordable and keeps businesses in check. It also encourages them to grow and expand their product lines through entrepreneurship.