To Beat Recession, Indies Launch Buy-Local Push

BusinessWeek Online

To Beat Recession, Indies Launch Buy-Local Push

Small business owners are banding together to encourage consumers to shop nearby independents. Would such a campaign help your business?

By John Tozzi

The buy-local movement isn’t new. For the past decade, independent businesses have banded together to urge local consumers to spend more of their dollars closer to home. Proponents say doing so helps build vibrant local economies by keeping money circulating in the area rather than elsewhere, while detractors say the economic benefits are negligible. Now, amid the sinking national economy, some small-business owners are saying buy-local efforts have helped insulate them from the worst of the downturn.

That’s the case for Chuck Robinson, owner of Village Books in Bellingham, Wash., who helped launch the city’s buy-local effort in 2003. While sales have dropped 4% since Jan. 1 at his 40-employee, $3.5 million bookshop and adjacent card store, he says that’s less severe than other booksellers he’s talked to in places that don’t have buy-local efforts. According to a national survey by the nonprofit Institute for Local Self-Reliance in Minneapolis, independent retailers in cities with buy-local campaigns saw holiday sales fall 3.2% from the prior year, while those in cities with no such movements recorded a 5.6% drop. Nationwide, retail sales fell 9.8% in December 2008 vs. the prior year, according to the Commerce Dept. Read more.

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