Local Futures

  • Home
  • Media room
  • Blog
  • Store
  • Contact

The Economics of Happiness

Donate
Menu
  • About us
    • Who we are
    • Founder, Helena Norberg-Hodge
    • Get involved and support us
    • Our history
    • Close
  • Projects
    • Connect globally and locally
      • World Localization Day
      • Voices from the Field
      • Localization Action Guide
      • International Alliance for Localization
        • Join the IAL
        • IAL members
          • IAL member organizations
          • IAL Listserv
      • Ladakh Project
      • Planet Local
        • Culture
        • Eco Communities
        • Ecology
        • Health
        • Local Business & Finance
        • Local Energy
        • Local Food, Farming & Fisheries
        • Local Policy & Community Rights
        • Place-based Education
        • Sharing & Repairing
    • Gain a big picture perspective
      • Blog
      • Local Futures Podcast
        • Jeremy Lent: Shifting Paradigms
        • COP, carbon and high-tech: who is setting the agenda?
        • Beyond Conspiracy: Framing Meaningful Activism
        • Unpacking Global Empire from an Indigenous Perspective
        • More than Just the Vegetables
        • Food Sovereignty in the Global Economy
        • Transition, Tradition, and Trade
        • Not-for-Profit Businesses
        • Love, Values, and Wellbeing Economies
        • Growing a Farmers Market from the Ground Up
        • Beautiful Places: A Conversation with Wendell Berry
        • Creating the Framework for a New Economy
        • From GDP to GNH
        • Rebuilding Healthy Communities: The Growing Ecovillage Movement
        • Seeds of Resilience, Seeds of Sovereignty
        • Why Local Ownership Matters
        • Local Alternatives to Globalized Development: A View from India
        • How to Feed the World? A Political Agroecological Approach
        • Helena Norberg-Hodge on how corporate ‘free trade’ deals threaten local communities and economies worldwide
      • Webinars
        • Sacred Activism in a Post-Trump World Webinar
        • Talking Climate Webinar
        • People Power: Democracy and the Economy Webinar
        • Beyond Trump: The Path to Real Change Webinar
        • Bringing the Food Economy Home Webinar
        • A World Without ‘Free’ Trade: What it would look like and how to get there
        • Beyond ‘Free Trade’ – Alternatives to Corporate Rule
        • Education: Promises, Myths & Realities Webinar
        • Debt and Speculation in the Global Economy Webinar
        • A New Activism Webinar
        • Climate Change or System Change Webinar
        • Going Local Webinar
      • Powerful talks
      • The Economics of Happiness film
      • Films and short videos
      • Books and reports
    • Close
  • Events
    • Upcoming events
    • World Localization Day
    • Economics of Happiness conferences
    • Other past events
    • Close
  • Action resources
    • Learn about our work
      • Globalization – drivers and impacts
      • Localization – a solution-multiplier
      • Big Picture Activism – rethinking basic assumptions
    • Action tools
      • Localization Action Guide
      • Covid-19 response: let’s localize like never before
      • Maps of alternatives
      • Organizations for change
      • Independent media sources
      • Films for change
      • Recommended readings
    • Close
  • Books, reports & videos
    • Books and reports
      • Local is Our Future by Helena Norberg-Hodge
        • Endorsements for Local is Our Future
        • Translations of Local is Our Future
      • Ancient Futures by Helena Norberg-Hodge
      • Free reading materials
      • Newsletters & annual reports
      • Translated resources
    • Films and short videos
      • PLANET LOCAL : A Quiet Revolution film
      • LOCAL: A Story of Hope short video
      • Local Food Can Save The World short video
      • Going Local: the solution-multiplier animation
      • Insane Trade short video and factsheet
        • Insane Trade! & factsheet translated
      • The Economics of Happiness film
      • Ancient Futures film
      • Planet Local short film series
        • 1 – Introduction: The new local food movement
        • 2 – Diverse farming systems
        • 3 – Local food webs: Exploring systems of distribution
        • 4 – Local food processors: AKA making delicious food
        • 5 – Challenges & solutions
        • 6 – Ecovillages & networks for new farmers
        • 7 – and finally… Here’s a little more inspiration
    • Close
You are here: Home / Local finance / Adopt a Local Business

Adopt a Local Business

May 14, 2020 by Michael H. Shuman 2 Comments

Many of us show our compassion and generosity through acts of adoption. Adopt a tree, adopt a baby giraffe, adopt a schoolchild, etc. For the last two weeks, my partner Audrey and I adopted a lovely four-legged pooch named Annie. Her “person,” a close friend, had to travel to Western Massachusetts to be with her dying mother. I’m not exactly a dog person – I didn’t grow up with dogs, and throughout my adult life my travel schedule has made me reluctant even to adopt a cactus. But Annie’s visit lit up our lives. Now that she’s gone, I miss our late evening walks, her unexpected bark-mania riffs, and her periodic drop kicks on our bed at 3 am. Adopting Annie was a small way to support my community.

As COVID-19 destroys more American lives than the Vietnam War and more American jobs than the Great Depression, all of us are being called to consider acts of adoption. Here’s an easy possibility: Adopt your favorite local business.

Local businesses are the lifeblood of our communities. They are not only responsible for most of our local jobs and taxes, they also are our social anchors. There’s compelling evidence that communities with thriving local businesses have lower rates of crime and poverty, and higher rates of giving, volunteering, and voting.

Today we’re on the verge of losing literally millions of these businesses. Federal loans will help a few survive—at least those with strong political or bank connections – but others are failing fast. I wish I could agree with our national leaders that the virus is behind us. But the awful truth is that once you remove the New York region from the data, infection and death rates are still climbing. In some states this will mean continued shutdowns. In others it will mean businesses operating with thin traffic, while most traditional customers remain terrified to leave their homes. Either way, the future for local businesses looks bleak.

Over the last 25 years, Main Streets across America have been decimated by shopping malls, box stores, and online behemoths like Amazon. Many clawed their way back through buy-local movements, placemaking initiatives, and smart city planning, but all this progress is in danger of being undone. Every community could soon have its streetscapes dotted with boarded businesses.

That’s why we must act now.

We cannot save every local business. But perhaps we can save a few. So here’s a simple proposal: Adopt just one business you love, figure out how much you spend there in a typical year, and – if you can – pay it now and start a tab there. If your neighbors join you, your favorite business will have a cash-flow bump to rehire old employees and get restarted.

My adopted local business is Busboys and Poets, started by an entrepreneur named Andy Shallal. The first Busboys, near where I once lived in U Street corridor in DC, was a huge hit. It had a bar, bookstore, restaurant (featuring healthy local food), and event space, and became one of the most important “third places” in the region. It’s where I always do my book launches. In recent years it has spread to six other locations in the DMV (DC-Maryland-Virginia) region. Andy has trained, hired, and given great pay and benefits to 1,500 people, many young and lacking previous job experience. Andy agreed that I can prepay $1,000 to Busboys, which is what I normally spend in a year, and gave me a $1,200 gift card in appreciation. (Thank you, Andy!)

My friend Judy Wicks, the most dog-friendly person I know (she started and then sold the White Dog Café in Philadelphia), has adopted dozens of her favorite businesses. For several years, Judy has organized a micro-loan fund called Circle of Aunts and Uncles. It provides loans to Philly entrepreneurs, mostly poor and nonwhite, who don’t have access to “family and friends” capital. When the pandemic fully hit in March, she encouraged the many thousands of people in her network to buy electronic gift certificates from their adopted businesses that they could use later or just convert into gifts.

If you’re skeptical whether your personal act of adoption will make a difference, here’s a suggestion: Email your favorite business owner and just ask. I’m betting that, money aside, just the act of reaching out will be the highlight of his or her otherwise dismal week.

But scale matters. How can we convince friends, neighbors, and others to join us? The more businesses we can support this way, the faster we can restore our local economies and communities. Fortunately, there’s at least one company ready to help.

Last year, I introduced my readers to Protegra, a worker-owned company in Winnipeg, Manitoba. It was then marketing a well-designed, buy-local loyalty app called Local Frequency, which rewards every dollar you spend at a locally owned business with discounts and benefits usable at other locally owned businesses. Protegra is keenly aware that communities do not have the bandwidth for launching Local Frequency right now. But they see the value – as do I – in providing communities with a platform immediately for an “Adopt a Business Campaign.” Like the organization on whose blog this essay is posted, they call it “Local Futures,” though the two groups are not connected. You can read more and watch a short video about it here.

Protegra will work with your community to set this up, list adoptable businesses, and assign a appropriate discount rate for the pre-purchasing. My $500 pre-purchase at the neighborhood deli might be worth $700 of meals, as a thank you.

I did point out to Protegra, a Canadian company learning about U.S. law, that in 16 states, the so-called “risk capital test” might consider this transaction a security, which means – outrageously – that the business in those states would have to make an expensive filing to state and federal authorities before it could accept my money. To avoid this problem, you should only adopt businesses which: have been around for a while (i.e, not startups); where you can claim your rewards relatively reliably and easily; and where your discounts are modest. Honestly, I think this is a pretty easy line to walk. In the other 34 states there are no such limitations to worry about.

If you’re interested in launching a community-wide “Adopt a Business” campaign, please contact Tyler Ibrahim at Protegra immediately. His e-mail is [email protected]. If that too big a step, just adopt a business yourself.
 

Image: Ken Hawkins, CC BY 2.0

Share this:

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn

Related

Locking Down Leviathan
Our Robot Overlords

Filed Under: Community, Coronavirus, Local finance, Localization Tagged With: community, economics, jobs, livelihoods

Author: Michael H. Shuman

Michael H. Shuman is an economist, attorney, author, entrepreneur, and a globally recognized expert on community economics. He has authored or coauthored eight books, including Local Dollars, Local Sense: How to Move Your Money from Wall Street to Main Street and Achieve Real Prosperity.

Comments

  1. Darryl Nelson says

    May 14, 2020 at 1:47 pm

    Thanks Michael,

    We are reassured that our adopt a local business strategy which we have been practising since the beginning of lockdown here in Australia, is the right thing.

    Darryl and Mary Nelson

    Reply
  2. John Smith says

    May 23, 2020 at 6:47 pm

    In this difficult time, small businesses really need support and it is very important that there are initiators of such a great idea. Thanks for the info. Good luck to you!

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I accept the Privacy Policy

Subscribe to the Economics of Happiness Blog

Sign up for our email updates

Latest Blogs

  • The food shortage solution in your backyard

    June 15, 20221 Comment
  • Supply chain failures: another reason for localized economies

    June 8, 20221 Comment
  • The dirty truth about clean energy

    May 25, 20228 Comments
  • Pandemic Blues

    April 20, 20224 Comments
  • The Radical Roots of Community Supported Agriculture

    April 6, 20222 Comments
  • Repairing broken economies

    March 31, 20221 Comment

Blog posts by Category

  • Capitalism (10)
  • Cities (2)
  • Climate Change (54)
  • Community (32)
  • Consumerism (6)
  • Coronavirus (19)
  • Democracy (4)
  • Development (24)
  • Economic Growth and Degrowth (34)
  • Economics of Happiness Conferences (4)
  • Education (9)
  • Energy (3)
  • Environment (45)
  • Food and Farming (69)
  • Free Trade and Globalization (44)
  • Happiness (5)
  • Health (26)
  • Indigenous worldview (16)
  • Inequality (7)
  • Inner transformation (16)
  • Livelihoods and jobs (38)
  • Local energy (9)
  • Local finance (5)
  • Local food (12)
  • Localization (56)
  • Nature (5)
  • New economy (20)
  • Resistance and Renewal (18)
  • Technology (36)
  • The Economics of Happiness (17)
  • Transportation (2)
  • Uncategorized (4)
  • War (1)

Local Futures Logo
About us
Contact
Get involved
Privacy Policy

Projects
The Economics of Happiness film
Events
Action resources
Books, reports and videos
Blog
Store

Sign up for our email update

Donate

Local Futures © Copyright 2022 | site by digiflip
 

Loading Comments...