Shop Small. Support Local.

It's kind of what we're about after all :) Shop Local is a huge campaign that is focused on keeping jobs and money in our own communities. Why are we sending jobs overseas when we have so many unemployed neighbors? Why are we giving so much space to Wal-mart? This is an article from www.staylocal.org (granted it's about New Orleans) that pretty well sums up exactly why we should keep it local. Just say "Cincinnati" in place of New Orleans to get the full effect.
Check it out and tell me what you think! I'll be finding more "Keep it Local" stuff to share this week, let me know if you find anything!

WHY SHOP LOCAL

Eat Here or We Both Go Hungry

Top Ten Reasons to Shop Local

1. PROTECT LOCAL CHARACTER AND PROSPERITY

New Orleans is unlike any other city in the world.  By choosing to  support locally  owned businesses, you help maintain New Orleans'  diversity and distinctive flavor.

2. COMMUNITY WELL-BEING

Locally owned businesses build strong neighborhoods by sustaining communities, linking neighbors, and by contributing more to local causes.

3. LOCAL DECISION MAKING

Local ownership means that important decisions are made locally by people who live in the community and who will feel the impacts of those decisions.

4. KEEPING DOLLARS IN THE LOCAL ECONOMY

Your dollars spent in locally-owned businesses have three times the impact on your community as dollars spent at national chains. When shopping locally, you simultaneously create jobs, fund more city services through sales tax, invest in neighborhood improvement and promote community development.

5. JOB AND WAGES

Locally owned businesses create more jobs locally and, in some sectors, provide better wages and benefits than chains do.

6. ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Entrepreneurship fuels America's economic innovation and prosperity, and serves as a key means for families to move out of low-wage jobs and into the middle class.

7. PUBLIC BENEFITS AND COSTS

Local stores in town centers require comparatively little infrastructure and make more efficient use of public services relative to big box stores and strip shopping malls.

8. ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY

Local stores help to sustain vibrant, compact, walkable town centers-which in turn are essential to reducing sprawl, automobile use, habitat loss, and air and water pollution.

9. COMPETITION

A marketplace of tens of thousands of small businesses is the best way to ensure innovation and low prices over the long-term.

10. PRODUCT DIVERSITY

A multitude of small businesses, each selecting products based, not on a national sales plan, but on their own interests and the needs of their local customers, guarantees a much broader range of product choices.