Local stores await customers’ return

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 01/06/2020 (2098 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Shopping for a new pair of running shoes, I called up Amazon on my smartphone and easily found the ones I want, a model with the unwieldy name of Under Armour Mens Charged Pursuit 2. The Amazon price is C$77.93.

The same model is also available at a store in the mall closest to my Winnipeg home. The price there is $89.99. As well as being more expensive, it’s more difficult to shop in person at this store than it is to click a purchase at Amazon. To buy at the store, I must drive to the mall and navigate new pandemic restrictions.

Even though buying the shoes through Amazon is cheaper and easier, the decision was easy: Amazon be damned.

Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon — he’s on his way to becoming the world’s first trillionaire — doesn’t need to profit from my purchase of shoes. Winnipeg’s retail businesses, on the other hand, need our support more than ever.

The encouragement to shop at local businesses is nothing new. As long as businesses have united in organizations such as chambers of commerce, there have been regular campaigns with slogans designed to appeal to hometown loyalty, such as “What stays local, grows local.”

But now shopping locally is not just thoughtful; it’s crucial to help the Manitoba economy bounce back from the economic fallout caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

It’s been particularly hard on retailers who were forced to close or experiment with safe options such as curbside pickup. Unfortunately, even as their income slowed to a dribble or stopped completely, many expenses continued, with business owners still on the hook for rent, taxes, utilities and payments on business loans.

Some Manitoba businesses, deciding the hole is too deep to climb out of, have already announced their permanent closures, and many more are thought to be on the brink. Popular hospitality hot spots that have recently thrown in the towel include Hermanos Restaurant & Wine Bar in the Exchange District, the original location of Stella’s restaurant in Osborne Village, and Segovia Tapas Bar and Restaurant, also in Osborne Village.

Other sectors hit hard are the stores that sell clothing, vehicles, furniture, sporting goods, general merchandise and personal services such as hairstyling.

As these businesses reopen, they need regard from those of us who are fortunate enough to still have jobs and disposable income. Yes, it’s possible local businesses will need to add a pandemic surcharge to their goods and services to help offset the heavy costs of the past two months. Yes, it’s often cheaper and easier to click on online retailers.

But buying from Manitoba businesses is investing in our province. The store where I decided to buy my running shoes hires Winnipeg people, including a young man I recognize from our neighbourhood. The store’s employees pay taxes in Manitoba and spend much of their salaries in Manitoba. The store pays rent to our local mall, allowing it to stay open and provide a warm place to shop in Winnipeg winters.

Contrast this with online shopping: two-thirds of the retail money spent online by Canadians goes to U.S. retail websites. Business behemoths such as Amazon don’t hire Manitoba people; they don’t have brick-and-mortar stores in Manitoba, so they don’t pay rent or property taxes. Their only economic interest in Manitoba is to extract money without giving back.

People who work in retail are familiar with “showroomers,” a term applied to people who seek only to examine a product in a local store before buying it online at a lower price. They have no intention of supporting the local enterprise that incurred the overhead costs of bringing in and displaying the goods, and no qualms about wasting the time of store staff, many of whom work on commission.

The retail industry is supposed to be helped by the massive increases of government spending that is going directly to consumers in the hope that they will keep spending. The majority of economists who are educated in these matters say unprecedented government intervention in the economy is the proper course, as long as the government money circulates.

That’s good in theory, but the government money doesn’t circulate here if a person’s $500 government cheque is spent with an online U.S. retailer. Instead, Manitoba will be most helped if the recipient uses the $500 cheque to buy items — perhaps pants, a phone charger and books — at Manitoba stores, which can then hire local store staff and pay rent to local landlords, who in turn spend their money at other Manitoba businesses, and so on. Government aid can fertilize the Manitoba economy, but local businesses won’t bloom if the cash leaves the country.

A phrase often used when the pandemic first hit was “We’re all in this together.” It’s a sentiment very much worth remembering as Manitoba’s retail sector strives to reopen.

carl.degurse@freepress.mb.ca

Carl DeGurse is a member of the Free Press editorial board.