Well it’s that time of year again. Christmas shopping! There’s always a big push to “shop local” and I think that’s cool, but I don’t know what it means. We just had “Shop Local Saturday” right after “Black Friday.” I’m not looking for emotional spankings or anything like that, but I’d really like to know what the definition of “shop local” is.

If you think retailers and think Maine, you’ve got to come up with L.L. Bean. What’s more Maine than that? Yes, they’re in Freeport, but that’s pretty close. Wait just a minute, here. If you look at the descriptions in the catalog just about everything is imported. So is that shopping local? I have to say that I love L.L. Bean’s stuff. It’s great quality, looks good and fairly priced. Seems sort of too bad that we can’t or don’t make that sort of stuff here in America, or Maine.

Let’s go to Main Street. Is the nice little shop on Main Street that sells gifts and souvenirs made overseas a shop-local store? Yes, they’re owned by a local person, perhaps have an employee or two who live in the area, but many, if not most, of their products are made in another country.

I know not to go to the big stores. Avoid franchises, too. All that money goes to some unknown place where fat cats sit around all day counting our money. But wait. I know some people who work in those big stores. They live in my town and pay taxes. They buy groceries and gas from the stores in my town. The money they make goes right back into my community. Being a business consultant I know that the biggest expense for any business is labor. So if 300 people are working at a big store, that’s a lot of money that goes right back into the communities we live in.

As I go down through the various businesses that we have in the area, the only industry that I can see that is purely local is hospitality. If you stay in a room or eat a meal, you can be pretty assured that you’ve “shopped local.” Beyond that, I don’t know how you can tell. Here’s another one: If I buy a tractor from a dealer in town and the tractor is made in another country, am I shopping local?

Now that everyone has their pantyhose all knotted up, let me explain. Shopping local is very important to our economy. I grew up in Camden in a time when there were no other options. We had to shop local. When folks get up on their soapbox and promote their simple “shop local” concept, I have trouble buying it, because it’s way more complicated than that.

I guess if you go to New Hampshire and buy a flat screen TV or refrigerator, you’re not shopping locally, but otherwise it seems to me that if you leave your dollars in the area that you live, you’re doing a good thing regardless of where the home office of the company is. You’re sustaining jobs that pay people so that they have money to spend locally, too. If you have some sort of social issue about how much those folks get paid, that’s between you and them. They are getting a paycheck and likely spending it locally.

I think every Saturday should be “Shop Local Saturday.” Whatever that is.

P.S. I’m not for or against anything. I’m just observing.  

Bill Packard lives in Union and is the founder ofBPackard.com.  He is a speaker, author, small business coach and consultant. 

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