Impacts observed by Indies in towns with active independent business alliances as a result of a “Buy local/Buy Indies” campaign:
*47% said it brought new customers to their businesses
*55% said it had improved the loyalty of existing customers
*68% said it had increased local media coverage of Indies
*51% said it had made town officials more aware and supportive of Indies– Institute for Local Self Reliance (1/26/11)
10 Reasons Why Concord’s Homegrown Economy Matters
(adapted from Stacy Mitchell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance)
1. Local Character and Prosperity
In an increasingly homogenized world, communities like Concord that preserve their one-of-a-kind businesses and distinctive character have an economic advantage.
2. Community Well-Being
Locally owned Concord businesses build strong communities by sustaining vibrant town centers, linking neighbors in a web of economic and social relationships, and contributing to local causes.
3. Local Decision-Making
Local Concord ownership ensures that important decisions are made locally by people who live in the community and who will feel the impacts of those decisions.
4. Keeping Dollars in the Local Economy
Compared to chain stores, locally owned Concord businesses recycle a much larger share of their revenue back into the local economy, enriching the whole community.
5. Job and Wages
Locally owned Concord businesses create more jobs locally and, in some sectors, provide better wages and benefits than chains do.
6. Entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurship fuels America’s economic innovation and prosperity, and serves as a key means for families to move out of low-wage jobs and into the middle class… and beyond.
7. Public Benefits and Costs
Local stores in town centers like Concord’s require comparatively little infrastructure and make more efficient use of public services compared to big box stores and strip shopping malls.
8. Environmental Sustainability
Local stores help to sustain vibrant, compact, walkable town centers like Concord’s — which in turn are essential to reducing sprawl, automobile use, habitat loss, and air and water pollution
9. Competition
A marketplace of tens of thousands of small businesses is the best way to ensure innovation and low prices over the long-term.
10. Product Diversity
A multitude of small businesses, each selecting products based, not on a national sales plan, but on their own interests and the needs of their local Concord customers, guarantees a much broader range of product choices.
