Compelling Reasons to Buy Local

Spokane? Kelowna? Calgary?

Think Local This Holiday Season

By Mike Stolte - originally published in the Nelson Daily News Nov. 27, 2009

Spokane. Kelowna. Even Calgary. My heart races as I think of the bright lights, swarming holiday crowds and possible great deals. Yes, it’s tempting to think of a road - read ‘shopping’ - trip to these exotic locales but this year it makes more sense than ever to ‘think local’. The economic downturn is taking its toll on local retailers, service providers (which our area has an abundance of), and other businesses. These businesses sponsor Nelson Minor Soccer, give to the CT Scanner, and donate to countless community causes.

Thinking and buying local has never been hotter. When the Economist magazine recently suggested that the world needs to revisit buying local (and local/regional self-reliance) – a break from their normal trumpeting of globalization and bigger is better– people took notice. It’s now not just a fringe movement.

Not surprisingly, Nelson is on the cutting edge of think and buy local movements:

§ A well-crafted Shop-Local campaign (shop-nelson.com) spearheaded by the Nelson Business Association, and supported by many local businesses, the NDCU and the Chamber of Commerce is more than likely catching your attention. It focuses on local business owners citing why they’re shopping local. The photos are awesome. The campaign looks pretty high end.

§ The Nelson and District Credit Union is promoting its 100 Mile Mortgage (the NDCU’s whirling dervish Bradley Roulston has made numerous presentations and radio appearances to extol the virtues of buying local). As Bradley likes to ask, “Would you rather pay your kid $10 to mow your lawn or bring in someone from 150 miles away to save $0.50?” The argument has logic.

§ Local web development company Yellowseed recently launched GYOS.ca (Get/Grow/Give Your Own Stuff), a web-site designed to allow for the local swapping, trading and buying of goods and services, with a cool component focusing on locally grown food (the Five Mile Diet). What better way to get rid of those excess plums! GYOS has spread all over the Kootenays and to the Sunshine Coast.

§ Our local food movement has caught the attention of people around North America thanks to the tireless work of many including Abra Brynne, Matt Lowe, and Jon Steinman. Steinman has become a food celebrity thanks to his informative syndicated radio show on KCR, Deconstructing Dinner. The Nelson/Creston grain CSA (community supported agriculture - www.kootenaygraincsa.ca) has even caught the attention of Parliament.

§ Even my own organization, CIEL, got into the act earlier this year, hosting the 100 Mile Ideas Diet, a speaker series over five months at Oso Negro that featured local experts and community conversations on important issues of community vitality (housing, arts and culture, business vitality, innovation, localization).

Mike Shuman, author of the Small-Mart Revolution (small-mart.org) believes that thinking local is the only sure way to keep our main streets vital. He cites four major reasons for buying locally:

1. Locally owned businesses stay in the community. Their owners are rooted. They’re here in good times and stick it out through the bad. Many US communities have been burned when large businesses – many that have received incentives and/or tax breaks - pull up stakes and leave.
2. Local businesses have a higher economic impact, known as an economic multiplier. One study that Shuman cites from Austin Texas, showed that $100 spent at a Borders bookstore returned only $13 to the local economy. That same $100 spent at a local bookstore put $45 back into the local economy (in wages, donations, local purchases, etc.). In other studies money spent in locally-owned business consistently has double to triple the impact as non-local. In his book, Shuman provides many compelling examples, deconstructing myths and long-held beliefs about big corporation recruitment. Many big non-local corporations receive subsidies, while actually being net drains on local taxes. In a place like Nelson, with a higher number of services (acupuncture, massage, etc.), that $100 spent at a local business returns a full $100 to the local economy (less a bit of tax) that keeps ricocheting from business to business.
3. Local businesses have a size and character that is much more consistent with what makes communities flourish. People want to live in vibrant, walkable communities where people know their name (‘Cheers’ where, hopefully, people won’t lock the doors when you want to get out).
4. Local businesses have a smaller carbon footprint than non-local.

While a trip to Spokane is most likely in the cards sometime this holiday season, I’m committing to spend at least 10% more of my Christmas money in local businesses.

Mike Stolte is the Executive Director of the Nelson-based Centre for Innovative & Entrepreneurial Leadership (CIEL - www.theCIEL.com).