buy local

Lori Webster has been feeling the love recently. Small business love, that is. She's been telling the customers of her family-owned stationery store about the 3/50 Project, one of many campaigns to support local small businesses.

Then last week, Tom Hanks walked into Webster's Fine Stationers in Altadena, Calif.—about 20 miles from Hollywood. Celebrities aren't unheard-of in the store: The actor John C. Reilly lives in the neighborhood and drops by occasionally.

But Hanks, who was filming on location across the street, went out of his way to talk up small business. "He told us how nice it is to shop at a family-owned business and how he particularly liked family-owned stationery stores," Webster says. Along with extolling the virtues of small business, and disparaging their big-box competitors, Hanks asked about Webster's history, posed for pictures, lamented the closing of the family's card store nearby, and bought $120 worth of pens, notebooks, and puzzle books.

A “Sleeping Giant” for Arizona’s Economy?

Local First Arizona economic study finds half-billion dollar annual impact from newly privatized SCF Arizona

Phoenix, AZ (June 7, 2010) – Local First Arizona (LFA), a non-profit organization representing a coalition of local and independent Arizona businesses, issued the findings today of an economic impact study commissioned by LFA that scientifically measures the economic impact of buying locally. The study demonstrates that locally-based SCF Arizona, the state’s largest workers’ compensation insurance supplier, has an annual economic impact in the state of approximately a half-billion dollars. The findings, reported by Applied Economics found that last year SCF sourced 82 percent of its goods and services from other Arizona companies, resulting in an overall economic impact in Arizona of $528.3 million in 2009. This one company – with 555 employees – demonstrates the power of buying locally. In other words, for every person SCF employs Arizona benefits economically by $952,000.

Okay. I'm definitely hooked on Go Local Sonoma County's website. There is so much excellent information on there that I couldn't help but make one more post on banking locally. The following information is taken from a post by Kelley Rajala and Terry Garrett.Make sure to follow the link to see a great Prezi on the Local Multiplier Effect. (Background: Prezi is similar to PowerPoint, but is less linear in both layout as well as scope.) Enjoy!

Support the Local

Olympic souvenirs, half price

Missing the Winter Olympics? Ease the pain with a visit to the USOC Training Center in Colorado Springs, where all Vancouver and Team USA Vancouver merchandise is half price at the USOC Training Center Shop, 1750 E. Boulder St., at the intersection of Boulder Street and Union Boulevard, 719-866-4792. All proceeds help support Team USA, which will make all those snazzy new items feel even better. The shop is open 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and the Training Center also offers free tours -- so make a day of it.

More groups are forming to send shoppers to home-grown independent businesses. But their impact on jobs is hard to quantify.

By now, residents of Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood have figured out that their trendy new coffee shop, 15th Ave. Coffee & Tea, is actually owned by Starbucks. With fresh flowers, beans ground to order, and a "help yourself" policy regarding used coffee grounds—for composting, of course—the store could pass for a locally owned café.

From Cleveland to Tempe, economic developers are convincing institutions with big spending power to shift more dollars to small businesses in their communities.

 

Prom dresses, $10
          If you know any families who will have to strain the budget to buy a prom dress, please tell them about the Prom Dress Exchange, where more than 3,000 gorgeous, gently used and freshly cleaned prom dresses will be available between 10:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m., on Saturday, March 20, and Sunday, March 21, at Copper Fields Events Chateau, 4901 Marshall St., Wheat Ridge, 720-898-8388. No one will insist, but a $10 donation to defray the cost of cleaning would be appreciated.
           This is the 10th Prom Dress Exchange for Copper Fields owner Cheryl Wise, who knows that the need is particularly great this year. She wants to make sure every dress finds a proud owner.  So please help spread the word by printing out a few copies of this item and posting it on bulletin boards wherever high school girls or their families might see it.

This Valentine's Day, we're asking you to give a little love to local businesses. Supporting our local economy in turn supports our community.

Did you know that 600% more of the money you spend at local businesses recirculates in within our community, making it 6 times more likely to come back to you.  

A little bit of love sure goes a long way. Here are a few suggestions for meeting your V-Day needs via local businesses.

 

Since this summer, I have been covering the ever growing movement of local governments adopting (or at the least formally encouraging) an internal purchasing preference to that which is local. This includes proclamations supporting local vendors as well as point systems that favor awarding contracts to local bidders. Now, I just got wind of an executive order issued by Colorado Governor Bill Ritter directing state agencies to adhere to the Buy American Provisions of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Though this isn't the typical hyper-localized "buy local" proclamation you're used to seeing, it is very important to consider the relative perspective of government-sized purchasing initiatives. This legislation isn't necessarily going to fuel a small town's economy or support a community that's easily tangible to the individual, but it certainly is focused on keeping money within the United States, which will affect us all in the long run.