Local business need support now: MCC, local entrepreneur

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This article was published 10/12/2021 (1606 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Local businesses are asking Winnipeggers to buy local, as the holiday season approaches after almost two years of economic hardships due to COVID-19 and subsequent restrictions.

For many businesses, Christmas sales make up a significant chunk of the year’s profits, and that’s certainly the case for a toy store.

“It’s anywhere from 50 to 60 per cent,” Toad Hall Toys owner Kari England said.

As Manitoba’s largest and oldest independent toy retailer, England’s company has joined the Manitoba Chamber of Commerce to encourage Winnipeg consumers to keep their dollars in the community.

For every dollar spent locally, 68 cents remains in the city, according to Community Futures Manitoba.

And for the city’s entrepreneurs those sales may be the only thing between keeping their businesses afloat and joining the other dozens of businesses now defunct due to the pandemic.

“(The support) means everything,” England said. “Without it, you’re not in business.”

While England is throwing her weight behind the call to buy local now, before the holidays, she said the business community needs Winnipeggers to consider buying local products all year round.

“There’s an awful lot of wonderful businesses in the city for people to discover and support. My family has always made it our goal to support other local businesses,” the second-generation owner said. “They work harder, they know their community. It’s not somebody out of Toronto or Montreal deciding what my community wants to buy. Because my community is not the same community as Toronto.”

President and CEO of the Manitoba Chamber of Commerce Chuck Davidson said local businesses need people to rally behind them sooner than later.

“We know the challenges that businesses throughout Manitoba have been dealing with over the course of the last 21 months, having to lay off staff, having to take on significant debt to be able to stay afloat,” he said. “Now’s the time that we’re asking Manitobans to give back. We’re asking for support.”

Davidson said besides doing their shopping at local businesses, people can help by posting about those purchases on social media using the hashtag #BuyLocalMB. His organization is trying to boost this social media campaign by offering the chance to win one of 10 prepaid $100 gift cards to anyone who uses the hashtag.

Besides that, Davidson wants Manitobans to simply take the time to reflect on how their spending can ripple through their community — or conversely, how their dollars might be seeping away into far-away pockets.

“It’s easy to simply go online, book everything through Amazon, but what we’re encouraging people to do is think about those small businesses and the challenges they’ve dealth with and at the same time to explore a little bit,” Davidson said.

 

He asked Manitobans to look around for new favourite stores or to source gifts from organizations like GoodLocal, which was founded by entrepreneur Obby Khan earlier in the pandemic and features the goods from various Manitoba businesses. GoodLocal operated online only until recently, when it opened a storefront at 223 McDermot Avenue.