Make yourself a Black Friday promise
The other morning, I ran into Mattie Daughtry, the owner of the craft beer pub, Moderation BArewing Company in Brunswick, Me. Since she couldn’t open her Maine St. location, I found Mattie selling holiday gift packs at the local farmers’ market.
“Things are tough with COVID,” Mattie said, “But we’re going to try every single strategy out there and be as creative as we can to survive. We’ll make it work.”
Mattie embodies the fighting spirit of many small business owners across the country at this perilous moment. The pandemic has left no corner of society untouched, but small businesses have been disproportionately impacted due to a combination of low foot traffic, razor-thin cash buffers and lack of access to capital markets. According to Alignable, a network of almost 6 million small businesses, nearly 70% of small businesses are still experiencing negative financial impact.
Why should any of this matter? Small businesses account for half of the country’s private sector employment and provide a real pathway to the American Dream. Beyond that, they constitute the fabric of our communities. They’re the dry cleaners, cafes and restaurants that give our towns and cities their unique character. If 20-30% of small businesses fail before the pandemic is over despite their best efforts, it’s not just a huge number of jobs and livelihoods that will be at risk. We also stand to lose the very things that make our communities feel like home.
So despite their resilience and determination, your local small businesses urgently need your help to make it to the other side of this crisis. We’ve now entered the holiday shopping season, a time when businesses both big and small rake in their biggest sales of the year.
Black Friday has arrived. Many bigbox retailers are enticing customers with adapted versions of the traditional in-store stampedes, redesigned to protect health and safety. Meanwhile, companies like Amazon are continuing to reap the benefits of skyrocketing e-commerce sales, thriving as consumers stay home and do their gift shopping online.
The clamor around Black Friday can sometimes overshadow its next-day neighbor, Small Business Saturday — a growing movement that pushes against shopping at large companies that already absorb a significant share of consumer purchases and advocates for buying gifts at local small businesses instead. But this year in particular, it’s Small Business Saturday that needs to be front and center.
Small Business Saturday was first created by American Express in 2010, when I was the administrator of the federal Small Business Administration (SBA). Our agency took the lead with other small business-focused nonprofits to encourage consumers to shop locally and help small businesses develop their sales strategy to draw in customers.
On that initial Small Business Saturday, the entire presidential cabinet was out and about on Main Streets. President Obama even took his daughters to a local bookstore to buy family gifts. Since then, the movement has gained momentum worldwide. Although it doesn’t have Thanksgiving, the United Kingdom has its own Small Business Saturday equivalent for its High Street stores.
Small Business Saturday’s growing popularity is a testament to just how much people care about supporting their local businesses and communities. So, although you may not be willing or able to visit your favorite small business in-person this Saturday, make sure to take advantage of other ways to support them.
Many small businesses are offering creative holiday specials tailored to the current times, including gift baskets with contactless delivery and certificates for desperately needed post-pandemic activities like haircuts. Keep an eye on your favorite businesses’ websites, social media pages and e-commerce platforms — and be sure to tell others about the unique offerings that are available.
To be sure, there’s still a major role for government to play in small business survival and recovery. I’m urging Congress to undertake another round of grant-based relief, with a focus on the smallest and most vulnerable businesses.
There are other key steps that policymakers should take too, like extending the interest forgiveness on SBA loans for another six months, and increasing SBA loan guarantee rates to 90% — a strategy that returned more than 1,000 banks to lending during the recovery from the 2008 financial crisis. These are bipartisan issues with bipartisan solutions. It’s time for Congress to lean in and do its part to help.
As you search for the perfect holiday gift, remember to shop small and keep your money local. From now until the end of the pandemic, let’s make every day Small Business Saturday.