Small Business Saturday gains momentum | small, business, retailers - Business - The Orange County Register
For decades, retailers have eagerly awaited the day after Thanksgiving, the unofficial launch of the Christmas shopping season. They even had a name for it - Black Friday - not because it was nightmarishly busy but because it marked the point in the year that most retailers started operating in the black.
The retailers tried to attract more business by opening early and offering special deals that day.
Then as more shopping went online, data analysts noticed that online shopping spiked the Monday after Thanksgiving as people returned to work and did their shopping from their desks, with or without the boss' blessing. They dubbed it Cyber Monday.
Then in 2009, consultant and stationary shop owner Cinda Baxter suggested that consumers should spend $50 each month at three locally owned small businesses to emphasize the importance of small businesses to the economy.
Credit card giant American Express loved the idea and came up with a special day on which to focus the idea: two days after Thanksgiving became Small Business Saturday in 2010.
"For every dollar spent at a local business, 68 cents goes back into the local community," said Rosa Sabater, senior vice president at American Express OPEN, an online community for small business created by the credit card giant.
Linda Ludlow, owner of the Huntington Beach toy store Bears, Buddies & Toys at Brookhurst and Adams streets, is all for it. She's one of millions of small businesses actively participating in Small Business Saturday.
Today, her shop is offering 25 percent discounts on all merchandise plus kids' photos in a wagon at the front door and gift drawings and swag bags full of toys for the first 25 customers who spend at least $40 in the store.
But Ludlow didn't wait for Nov. 26 because, she said, big retailers have already jumped the gun on Black Friday. She started offering discounts on Nov. 18.
Big retailers, such as Walmart and Target, have been featuring their Black Friday sales promotions all month, she said. "This year they started early so we're going to start early too!"
Register retail reporter Hang Nguyen says the National Retail Federation is forecasting a 2.8 percent growth to $465.6 billion in end-of-year sales, which are make-or-break for retailers of all sizes. That's a smaller jump than last year.
Small Business Saturday encourages Americans to bypass big companies to spend money at small businesses, services as well as retailers, which "help fuel the economy and invigorate communities across the country."
