When you #shopsmall, it always means big things for Chatham County.
That was the message from a number of local retailers this week in the wake of the after-Thanksgiving “Black Friday,” the traditional start of the Christmas shopping season.
In the last decade or so, Black Friday could more appropriately be termed as Black Thursday – with major retailers luring shoppers out on Thanksgiving Day in hopes of making cash registers sing with sales and turning P&L ledgers from red to black with profit. The increasing number of stores open that holiday, and the growth of online buying, pushed web-based retailers to create “Cyber Monday,” which, among other things, helped cram our email inboxes with notices of sales and specials long before we digested the turkey and stuffing we ingested late last week.
So where does that leave the “mom and pop” small business retailers who, like the big boxes, need a strong holiday sales season to make their year a good one?
Hopefully not out in the cold.
Small Business Saturday was one way for store owners in Siler City, Pittsboro and around the county to promote the experience and value of shopping locally. Dollars spent locally in locally-owned businesses tend to stay in-county and recirculate, creating the kind of retail “churn” that helps fill our collective coffers and give us all more financial stability (and keeping more of our sales tax revenues inside our county lines). There are certainly times when the selection, price and convenience offered by larger retailers make sense. But there’s never a time when it doesn’t make sense to cast your eyes close to home when doing your shopping and buying, particularly when it comes to the heavy buying season between Thanksgiving and Christmas. (For thoughts on the subject by local retailers, See story, Page A1.)
As store owners pointed out this week, Small Business Saturday is there to help draw attention to the importance of shopping locally. We encourage anyone with a shopping list to make #shopsmall, and shop local, a priority – not just between now and the end of December, but for any buying decision into the New Year.
Treasures abound in Chatham County. We’ll all benefit if we do our best to find them here before looking elsewhere.