Will YOU still be buying from small businesses?

[Yatima]

I own a small business, which was almost crippled by covid, only managed to get back on our feet earlier this year. Now with the announcement of the 80% energy hike, and inflation rising to 13% I'm worried this will finish us off for good.

When people cant afford to heat their own homes or cook their own food, who is still going to be buying from small businesses at a time like this? 😩

I will but I always have done
i don’t buy mass produced stuff-I like stuff that’s unusual and not on every shop
i will have to cut back though-one thing rather than five bits

I hope they do! Now more than ever small businesses need your custom. I'm a small business owner too and my business has been decimated this year, it's very worry. I've effectively had an 80% pay cut, no rise for my husband, runaway and inflation and every thing else rising. I honestly don't know where I stand at the moment.

Depends what the small business sells. Greengrocer, for example, yes if they’re competitive.
luxury items, no. Won’t be buying them anywhere.

Honestly op, probably not.

I've always bought from small and local businesses but it's always been discretionary spending because small businesses are not usually the cheapest. I like buying local though so I've been willing to spend the couple of quid extra.

However with the CoL this type of discretionary spending will be the first to go...I'll buy from wherever is the cheapest or best value.

What type of business do you have? Is there any way to diversity or reduce costs such as WFH instead of from a premises?

Same, I will still use the local butcher, unfortunately the greengrocer has gone out of business. But luxury items are out of my budget nowadays.

I agree. If you sell anything non-essential then it doesn't matter if you're Bezos or Bob I won't be buying anything from you.

I always buy from my local grocer rather than Tesco.But yes, given up buying luxuries.

Completely depends on what they sell (butchers for certain recipes) but I am cutting back on what we as a household spend so not buying anything unnecessary anyway.
In terms of gifts for Christmas and birthdays I will always try to find a smaller company/shop as I find the customer service more personal. I am fortunate enough to have discount at a supermarket due to working there so I do look at my workplace first before anywhere else and work out prices with discount.

And yet 4intheCorner the vast majority on here think all businesses have shareholders that are rolling around like pigs in shit.

Then when a small business says they can't absorb the price increases then people on here say its not a viable, but how can a small business particularly after Covid absorb this when margins are so tight? And its all well saying not viable so close but we have employees who depend on us.

With no price cap for energy we will have to increase prices as there is nothing left to cut.

If I have the money to spend then I’ll happily spend it with a small business. But it’s unlikely that I (or anyone else) will have the money to buy from anyone, regardless of whether they’re a small or large business.

I usually buy greetings card from our local independent shop instead of a supermarket. I also bought a household item from Etsy this week which I love. I have a zero waste refill shop near me that I will aim to use more. However, I have a habit of going to a big coffee chain but I am going to try harder to go to independent coffee shops more as I think they will struggle in these times. I wish we had a local butchers as I hate supermarket meat and farm shops are very expensive.

Yes, definitely. And eating out at privately owned/tenanted pubs not chains.

Yes for everyday items, such at grocer, butcher etc.

No for discretionary spending, gifts, coffees, lunches etc. My spending on these is being reduced and I will probably stop altogether once autumn arrives.

My DM owns a small business offering a product that is not an everyday spend and I am very concerned.

It depends-what do you sell?

I’ll be buying as much as I can from cheap supermarkets and won’t be buying luxury items at all.

I will. We won't be massively effected financially so I'll be extra cautious of which businesses I support. Particularly around Christmas

This year I still will. As we're on a price fix for energy until next October so our bills are thankfully still fairly low and so is our mortgage.
After next October, who knows? If it keeps going up at the current rate then not.

Will try, although we don't buy much 'stuff' anyway. We've had to really cut back on eating out, and always went to local places rather than chain restaurants, and our occasional weekends away in small independent hotels and B&Bs have stopped.

Thank you for asking this question. Some of these answers are giving me great hope. For many small businesses like mine this Christmas could be the saviour.

My company makes Christmas hampers. So many small businesses are closing and it's so sad

Yes. I won’t have many spare £’s this year but those that we do have will be going to independent shops, restaurants and cafes. No Amazon. No chain restaurants.

Really depends on what you sell.

Our local butcher closed recently and is only doing online for £75 or more worth of meat which I just can’t justify. We don’t have a local greengrocer. I tend not to eat out much but when I do I stick to locally owned businesses anyway.

But in terms of luxuries I’m unlikely to be buying those from anywhere.

My partner is a piano tuner and if anything his business has picked up because instead of going out people who own pianos are having them tuned and staying in more.

Totally depends on what the business sells.

I will but my non essential spending will go down.

I do my main shop in supermarkets now. In the past I have had organic veg boxes and things like that - if I was still doing that I would be keeping it under assessment.

If I've got the money, I'll continue to shop in the shops I usually buy from - whether large stores or local craft/diy shops as not worth the petrol money going elsewhere - unfortunately, I might be buying less from both and making careful decisions about choices.

Really hope you manage to keep your business going, OP. What does it sell?

We are making a conscious effort towards small businesses. Never particularly looked, strapped for time so convenience had a higher priority than discovering the neighbourhood and local businesses and all that. We are changing that now, because times are hard.

I realise we're lucky to be in that position financially, and that we are a minority, but still wanted to comment that that is also happening because people want you and other small businesses to succeed (even if not all can afford to buy there). Good luck!

Why wouldn’t you? I guess you offer something where there’s a market. If you’re selling stuff that’s sold on Amazon then maybe not but most of the stuff I buy from an independent is either because it’s unusual/niche or the service or there’s a value add. Good luck!