Buy Local This Holiday Season

If you’re like me your wallet seems to stay open from Thanksgiving through Christmas.

It’s a time to be festive – to spend time with family and friends, and to buy stuff.  Go out – eat, drink, and be merry.  Tis the season!

With the abundance of stuff tempting us to purchase I find myself having to take a step back and remember how important it is to look local first.

According to the 350 Project:

• When you spend $100 in a national chain only $43 stays in the community, the rest leaks out to the national headquarters or suppliers which are located elsewhere
• When you spend the same $100 in a locally owned independent store $68 returns to the community through taxes, payroll, and other expenditures.

Now in this day and age you know it’s not hard to spend $100 on a night out or Christmas gifts for family and friends.  Through the course of the holiday season most of us can multiply that several times over.

The 350 Project has a 2011 holiday campaign called Keep The Cheer Here.  Look for banners flying at participating businesses.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation recently posted a blog about the importance of buying local highlighting 3 national campaigns that give us gentle reminders to show our mom and pop’s some love:

• Shift Your Shopping – If you join us in shifting your holiday shopping dollars to locally owned, independent businesses, we’ll all generate 2-3 times as much economic activity in our community than if we had spent our money at a national chain.
• Plaid Friday – celebrates the diversity and creativity of independent businesses. Plaid Friday is the fun and enjoyable alternative to the big box store “Black Friday”, and is designed to promote both local and independently owned businesses during the holidays.
• Small Business Saturday – Your support on Small Business Saturday® helped make the day a huge success! Continue your part and keep the Shop Small movement going strong year round.

Now I know that the big box and chains are easy to find and are flooding us with advertisements but a little searching and you can find stores that specialize in local arts, crafts, beer, wine, etc.  Southern West Virginia CVB gave us a nice list of art galleries in West Virginia.

Listen to the buzz around town and you’ll probably find an open house at a local artists where you can buy your Christmas gifts directly from them like we did.

Painting by Fayetteville artist Winter Dawn Marie

Stained glass from Mountain Art Glass

And if you’re traveling overnight look for a bed and breakfast instead of a chain hotel to get that local flavor.  They may be offering specials to lure you in like the New Year’s Eve package at the historic Thomas Shepherd Inn in Shepherdstown, WV which includes tickets to see a local band (The Hillbilly Gypsies) at the Shepherdstown Opera House.

You could also come to my town – Fayetteville, WV – and catch our local band, the Wild Rumpus, at our New Years Eve bash at the Historic Fayette Theater and stay in one of our beautiful, historic Bed and Breakfasts.

Most of all have a safe and happy holiday season!

Tags: 350 Project, buy local, green travel, keep the cheer here, plaid friday, shift your shopping, sustainable tourism, travel green appalachia

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 6th, 2011 at 3:36 pm and is filed under Blog, Green Travel Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 Responses to “Buy Local This Holiday Season”

1. Jeanne Muir says:

   December 6, 2011 at 5:55 pm

   What a great reminder about the importance of shopping local! There are so many beautiful handmade, locally-made gift items in shops owned by your friends and neighbors, why bother with the stress of dealing with the traffic and crowds at the mall? I wrote a <a href="http://blog.thomasshepherdinn.com/2011/02/shopping-in-shepherdstown-for.html&quot; blog post last year stressing the same ideas for Valentine’s Day, highlighting some of the shops in Shepherdstown, WV. Fayetteville has some wonderful local shops as well.
   Thanks also for mentioning our New Year’s Eve Special – we’ve had a few bookings already because of the package, and we’re hoping to have a full house for New Year’s weekend. Staying local contributes to the economy just as much as buying local!
2. dougarbogast says:

   December 7, 2011 at 6:13 am

   Thanks Jeanne. Looking forward to our next trip to Shepherdstown. You have some great local shops in Shepherdstown and a beautiful downtown. I hope they are getting lots of business. Hope you have a great New Years Bash. It sounds like a lot of fun. Happy Holidays