San Benito ready to launch ‘Buy Local’ campaign
The peak holiday shopping time is just around the corner and a
group of San Benito leaders and businesses are hoping to keep more
local dollars local this season.
San Benito ready to launch ‘Buy Local’ campaign
The peak holiday shopping time is just around the corner and a group of San Benito leaders and businesses are hoping to keep more local dollars local this season.
“The whole idea of the ‘Local First’ campaign is to get people to think about how they spend their household dollars,” said Jeff Pyle, the economic development manger for Hollister. “A good percentage [of residents] commute out of town to work so it’s also natural when you are out of town to spend a lot of your household shopping dollars out of town.”
The San Benito Chamber of Commerce, through the tourism committee, has been working on a “Buy Local” campaign for more than a year and is ready to launch in the coming weeks just in time for the holidays. With a thriving agricultural industry that includes a variety of winter crops, organic poultry and grass-fed beef, award winning wines as well as retail merchants, residents will have plenty to choose from with a little help from the campaign.
The idea of a buy local campaign came out of early meetings with Don Shaffer, the director of the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies. The national organization has worked with communities across the nation to set them on a path of sustainable economic development.
“Historically, it has been driven by local cities and counties offering tax breaks or subsidies to bring in outside corporations,” Shaffer said at an all-day conference in Hollister Oct. 19. “It has had mixed results.”
Business owners, economic development leaders and integrated waste management employees from the greater Bay Area gathered to learn how San Benito has been rethinking economic development.
BALLE started working in San Benito more than a year ago at the invitation of Mandy Rose, director of San Benito’s Integrated Waste Management department. As part of a Central Coast Recycling Market Development Zone, businesses that use post consumer or secondary waste materials to manufacture new products or undertake projects to reduce waste are eligible for low-interest loans in San Benito. Rose and others on the RMDZ board found not many businesses were taking advantage of the program.
The Central Coast Recycling Market Development Zone hired Shaffer to conduct workshops to get out the word and soon he was engaged to brainstorm with community leaders about a variety of industries in San Benito that could reinvigorate the economy from within.
Ideas that came out of multiple meetings and talks include promoting organic agriculture and grass fed beef, zero-waste manufacturing and green building, renewable energy and a multi-year campaign to get residents to think of buying local first.
“This is the launch of the initial local first campaign,” said Liz Sparling of the San Benito Chamber of Commerce. “With the holidays coming, it will have a benefit to the retailers, but it is really generally for every [business].”
The committee will continue working on the campaign for 3-5 years, hoping to get a majority of locally owned businesses involved.
“In talking with different merchants, they have been very supportive,” Sparling said. “We think it will be received very well by the merchants and the businesses.”
Moving torward active participation could be key to the success of a buy local campaign, said Michelle Long, the director of Sustainable Connections, who also attended the conference in Hollister Oct. 19.
Long’s group is from Bellingham, Wash. and has worked on many of the areas in economic development that San Benito is considering. The nonprofit deals with sustainable agriculture, green building and has a flourishing buy local campaign in their city.
The buy local campaign in Bellingham started a few years ago and has grown to include more than 500 independently owned businesses. When they first started the program, participants invested money into commercial marketing and advertising to ensure they would have a fun, hip logo, Long said.
“It certainly made sure we had good design and good, solid marketing strategy was really critical,” Long said, of their logo that says ‘Think local, buy local, be local.’ “All the messages were funny and positive. Our agenda was never to be anti-anything.”
To be part of the campaign, merchants sign up for a year’s membership and may purchase a $20 retail kit that includes a buy local poster, a decal and tips on making the program work for them.
“Maybe the bookstore has local authors,” Long said. “Or the grocery store has a local cheese tasting. All kinds of things are happening.”
The group now even has a mascot, the “Be Local” Bee that wanders the downtown area during buy local events. Each year they put out a local coupon book for $10 that has a map of local farms as well as thousands of dollars in savings from local merchants.
“It brings a real critical mass and it looks like a much more big budget campaign because everyone is participating,” Long said.
A buy local campaign, such as the one in Bellingham, has more positive effects than just increasing sales at local merchants. San Benito’s tourism committee is aware of some of the other positive benefits.
“There is a whole other element to the campaign that is public education,” said Brenda Weatherly, of the Hollister Downtown Association. “I don’t think everyone realizes how much their tax dollars affect our town. When they spend their tax dollars out of town, they support that community – their police and parks.”
Reasons to buy local
·For every $100 spent at a locally owned business, $45 goes back to the community. Only $14 comes back from chain stores.
·Smaller business owners donate 2 ½ times more to nonprofits than do large businesses.
·Small local businesses are the largest employer nationally.
From Sustainable Connects “Top ten reasons to think local – buy local – be local.”
