On this traditional day of shopping and excess, the Black Friday where businesses hope to turn the red ink to black for the year, we need to remember the excessive red ink that has poured in a flood over small and locally owned businesses during the pandemic. The potential for failure and closure of small businesses has been extremely high for months, with some 60% reporting back in April that they had less than five months of likely survival without aid. Though some was forthcoming with the passage of the CARES Act, there has been no action on getting more aid to these businesses since the PPP program, and the effectiveness of that has been questioned more than once. Yet these businesses are the literal backbone of the economy and the way that money stays in communities. According the the Small Business Administration, some 60.6 million Americans are employed by small businesses in 2020, 47.1% of all employees in the United States. The 31.7 million small businesses represent 99.9% of all businesses in the country. They make up the livelihoods of our neighbors, friends, and communities.
And that is the point of this diary today, on a day when many are turning to that 0.1% of businesses to buy gifts for the upcoming holidays. This year, big businesses will expect to see even more action on this day than usual, as long as they have a significant presence online, since many will not be shopping in person as is traditional on Black Friday. But it is the small and local businesses that we need to pay attention to, to give our support and our dollars to, so that they can continue to sustain our local economies and our communities. It’s also well to remember that many local businesses give back to their communities in a wide variety of ways: local charitable giving, support for local causes, socially conscious business models, and many other ways of supporting the communities that give them life and livelihoods.
So this year, we should all look past this Black Friday and save our shopping for tomorrow, Small Business Saturday. Search out small and local businesses that you can buy gifts from. Take a break from Thanksgiving leftovers and order out from local restaurants (especially those that also do business locally with farmers and other local suppliers.) Give your money to those who will keep it in your own community and help strengthen it’s economy. Seek businesses that fulfill a larger social purpose with what they do. It’s as easy as using your favorite search engine and seeking out “Small Business Saturday in xxxx” or “local business in xxxx” to find a host of local businesses that you can support this holiday season. Look at the lists compiled by activists and media figures that seek to promote small and minority-owned businesses (Oprah and Beyoncé have both put these out recently.) As an example of this, in and near my own community of Durham I have recently given my business to both Bright Black candles (a very socially active and minority-owned business) and Benevolence Farm (a business that helps recently released female prisoners.) This is the kind of socially conscious and local spending that we all should keep in mind this holiday season.
After all, it’s your own community that you’ll be supporting.