The holiday shopping season is always critical for small businesses, but this year more so than ever. As small businesses have been hard-hit by restrictions due to the coronavirus pandemic, Can’t Stop Columbus and Venture for America have partnered to launch a new initiative that will help shoppers buy local online.
Shopsmall.co, the Shop Small Collective, is a directory of small, local businesses featuring a vast range of e-commerce gift-shopping avenues.
“This all started because we wanted to put together a small business holiday gift guide for Venture for America Fellows and Alumni across the country,” explains Nathan Zanzig, the project lead for Shop Small Collective and Venture For America Fellow working at ScriptDrop. “Now anyone can go to Shopsmall.co to find a curated list of small businesses in their city, and support them online”
Shopsmall.co launched in 10 cities, including Baltimore, Birmingham, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, Detroit, New Orleans, Pittsburgh, San Antonio and St. Louis, on Small Business Saturday, November 28.
On the website, shoppers can filter by city, category and tags like women-owned, Black-owned, sustainably sourced and more. Columbus’ lineup includes roughly 60 local small businesses offering apparel to jewelry to home goods and more. Business can also submit their information to be added to the list by clicking here.
A survey conducted by Deloitte LLP found that most folks plan to do at least some of their holiday shopping online this year – 95% to be exact. Many small businesses continue to struggle with in-person shopping both due to consumer confidence in safety amid rising COVID-19 case numbers, and because of a local stay at home advisory in place through at least December 18.
“Navigating safer shopping options and communicating them to our customers this holiday season has been an incredible challenge and we’re so grateful to this directory for helping Columbus friends connect virtually to the small businesses that make up our vibrant community,” says Wild Cat Gift & Party Owner Olivera Bratich. “This pandemic year has been tough but Columbus has always shown up for local businesses and we want to see this community continue to grow and thrive.”
For more information and to start shopping, visit shopsmall.co.
