Buy Local, Build Local, Brand Local

I have a new bone to pick. I have seen in recent days people trying to enter our local Quad City market with a campaign designed to line their pockets with local money and transfer that wealth out of the QCA to be invested and spent elsewhere. Don’t get me wrong, I am a capitalist and every company has a right to enter any market and sell its products and services. But, just as true is the fact that every one in that market has the right to buy local and keep the profits at home and at work in the community!

I for one, am on a mission these days. That mission is to teach, train, motivate, and encourage local business owners as well as clients and customers of those businesses to “buy local, build local, and brand local!”

I see five real benefits to such a plan:

1. Local businesses would reinvest their profits into the community in which they were made.
2. Local businesses would buy products/services from other local businesses.
3. Local businesses could pool their efforts to find ways to give back to their local markets.
4. Local customers/clients would have someone local to call if somethings needed to be done, fixed, or changed.
5. Local customers/clients would be more willing to refer local companies to their family and friends.

I know that larger companies can nearly every time win on price, but what a local company cannot do in the price game, they can more than make up for in the quality of service and “return to the community” efforts that the national brands cannot!

So, as often as you can, buy local, build local, and brand local! Just like milk that does a body good, this will do your business good!