5 reasons to shop at a local store.
1. Immediacy—when the customer buys a product at a brick and
mortar store, they get to use it immediately. When the exception of digital
media and PDFs, everything else purchased online takes time to reach them,
anywhere from a day to a month or better.
I was just checking out a Kickstarter produced by a local publisher and
backers will not receive the game until next March. Even modeling miniatures
with a 3D printer takes several hours to complete
2. Finding New Stuff—Despite the vast amount of products
available for sale online, in general customers don’t find new product online.
They are 3
times more likely to find a new product that delights them in a physical
store than in an online one (and don’t worry a lot about showrooming. According
to Harris, 70% of customers webroom
while only 45% of them showroom).
3. Reinvestment —More of their money stays in the local
community when a customer shops at a local store. If
a customer spends $100 at a local store, 68% stays in the local
community while if they shop at a chain
store, only 45% stays in the community to generate jobs and, of course, if they
buy online, none stays in the local community . In addition, there is a multiplier effect when that money
is spent in the community, meaning that money circulates to other business such
as office supply stores, janitorial services etc. . In a smaller community like
here in Carbondale or London Kentucky, the multiplier effect is only around 1
or 2 times before the money leaves the community but in a more metropolitan
area such as Seattle, St. Louis or Chicago, you are looking at a multiplier of
7 to 10 times. And, of course, the sales
taxes go back into such things as sidewalks, police, fire safety, sewers
ect.
4. Stronger
Communities—Research
shows that the more local businesses a community has, residents have
stronger civic ties and are more likely to participate in civic affairs.
Economic concentration among businesses leads to a monolithic local power structure and civic apathy. A
larger number of locally owned
businesses is positively correlated with participation in local
elections and civic activism, helping to counter the decline in civic
engagement in the US over the past several decades.
5. More Jobs—Local businesses create more jobs for local
people. Maybe it indicates inefficiency, but local
retailers create twice as many jobs as Amazon does for the same amount of
revenue. Spending money at the FLGS helps maintain jobs, both there and in the
large community.
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