Spend Locally!

That's right, Spend Locally! It's my new website, I've been tinkering with it for a while, and decided to cram and get it up and running in time for BarCamp this weekend. It's going to start out as a blog, but hopefully turn into more of a directory of local businesses. Why do I care about this?

Well, although my business, City Girl Designs, is temporarily closed, I do own a local business... and I work for a locally owned web company, Raised Eyebrow. And a lot of friends and family either work for or own local businesses... And when you think about it, that's what really makes up strong communities--diverse, locally owned business. The owners actually live here, so they care about what goes on and contribute to the community. Often they source out a lot more locally owned products to sell. And as far as stats, if you spend $100 at a local business, nearly half of that money stays in the community, whereas with a big non-local company, only about $15 will stay in the community (Portland Buy Local). Add to that the fact that locally made products save tons of energy used for transportation, are often made under more environmentally and socially ethical conditions, and you've got a win-win-win situation.

SpendLocally.ca is going to begin as a blog where I profile local (BC) businesses that I think are awesome, and in the future I hope to turn it into a full-out searchable directory. So, subscribe to the RSS and find out about all the great local businesses we've got around here!