To say go and support your local independent businesses

[Nutmuncher]

Just that really, retail is in absolute dire straits right now pretty much across the board. The big chain stores are better positioned to fight on through but your small independent shops in your local high street such as butchers, bakeries, antiques shops, homewards, art galleries, book shops, florists, coffee shops are all struggling and need our help no matter how small that may be.

That gorgeous tea room, cute card and gift shop, beautiful florist or dreamy book shop will be gone unless WE start using them as much as possible. Small businesses desperately need help and the true saviours will not be in the form of billionaires or politicians, it’s down to us to make sure they survive. Switch up your Starbucks for a local coffee, buy a bunch of flowers from your florist not M&S. Buy a print/ painting from your local small gallery instead of an IKEA picture, beautiful greetings cards can often be found in them too. I for one don’t want a high street full of vape shops, barbers and nail salons because they’re the only ones able to afford the rent on the units.

Your small switch up no matter how insignificant it may seem could make a huge difference to someone’s livelihood.

Actual small business - you bet.

All too often though ‘support small businesses’ on social media turns into MLMs pushing other MLMs at you.

Agree, we have also to look after ourselves financially.

In the case of butchers I do agree, support a butcher because it's better all round, and the meat is not dearer than the supermarket and butchering is a skill.

I think that those of us who can afford to shop around should support independents. But everyone's view will be different. I use a butcher, like to send nice cards, love bookshops. But I don't waste my money in nail bars when I can perfectly well do my own, for example.

My local coffee shop doesn't have skimmed milk - apparently "there's no demand for it"! So I go to Costa for my skinny latte.

Business models rise and fall all the time and are dependent on a multitude of factors. It's not a total stranger's responsibility to prop up a failing business that may be due to unrealistic pricing, bad location, poor marketing etc. To be perfectly honest, opening any type of small business is usually for selfish reasons. It's always "done out of love". They've always dreamed of owning a tiny shop, boutique, cafe etc in a specific vibe or aesthetic. Or it's a creator who always wanted to turn their hobby into a job and now sell things they enjoy making.

In order to make things profitable, they often have to charge prices that are simply nowhere near reasonable competition. Or they cut corners on quality, staffing, service etc. As a customer, I've been in small shops where the products all feel manky and "touched" by multiple people. The packaging often looks like it's been opened or could have been a return. I don't want a product like that if I can get a brand new one from a chain store. Similarly, been to many indie cafes where they display unrefrigerated baked goods in glass domes on the counter. God knows how long the cookies have been there and I've spotted mould on them before. I will take a packaged Pret brownie any day.

To be brutally honest, if the motivations of the owner(s) are self-centred then consumers are allowed to be selfish as well. Small businesses are usually created so someone can earn a living doing something they love rather than actually choosing an occupation based on current demands of the job market. Nobody is starting threads here begging people to support your local NHS dentist. The person who decided to become a dentist made a smart decision at some point in their life. The person who wants to make a living selling crocheted socks for dogs took a risk when they made that decision.

Yes i can deny it.

The butcher i use is regularly cheaper than the supermarket for things like braising steak and sausages compared to asda or Morrisons. His homemade pies are better and cheaper than the ones at Marks and Waitrose.

He headline price is more expensive for chicken and mince and bacon but none have them have bedn water injected so you need half the amount and it ends up being uneconomical.

He's really struggling because Birstall council have seen fit to introduce parking charges pushing people out to the big supermarkets.

Even if money is tight, you can shop more independently by going to your local market. It's where my butcher started and his son has just followed in his footsteps by opening his own fruit and veg stall at the same market.

My butcher is very open about his small profit margin, and I would much rather contribute to that rather than the huge profits supermarkets make.

I use our local independent shops all the time, meat from the butchers, fruit and veg from the greengrocer, and cakes from a local cake shop. There's only two local cafes I use now, one is the only one that opens before 9am (otherwise the only option is Costa) and the other I like the owner and can slightly forgive her dodgy business practice.

The other cafe we used to use we've been boycotting for a year, and there's at least 6 restaurants locally that have done the same thing as them. Stop paying their tax and other bills, go into voluntary administration, set up a new company and carry on trading. They buy the fixtures and fittings from the "old" company from the administrator. We now check all of them on companies house before we go anywhere, can take a bit of sluething, but we've decided we only want to support ethical businesses.

I donate quite a lot to various charities which support causes I'm sympathetic to, but I will not give money away to support independent businesses that are usually overpriced and offer poor customer service, particularly with restricted opening hours. They don't deserve my money - as someone said upthread, why would I pay £4 for a birthday card that I can get for 79p in Homebase? This is a capitalist society and the businesses that succeed are those that offer things people want at a price they can afford. If they don't, I'm not chucking my money at them for the sake of it. Dragons Den proves that there are some great entrepreneurs out there, but sadly, most new businesses fail within the first year. Life has changed since the coming of the Internet, and it's just inevitable that consumers will turn to online shopping that is so much more convenient. If you want to support small businesses, turn to Etsy. But the demise of the High Street is no great tragedy IMHO - just a response to changes in the way society operates.

I went to an independent place recently and the scones were definitely past best, they warmed them so smelled nice but a challenge to eat as dry. The coffee was meh. I think it’s all very well trying to support local owned businesses but they need to provide a product to enable repeat custom.

you check Company house before using a cafe?
That's a new one on me!

I'd do love to but in my town they're all closed on Sundays and Mondays (my day off) and open 10-3 or 10-4 during the rest of the week, often with a lunch time closure. There's a gorgeous coffee shop at the end of my road but it closes at 3pm but in reality they won't serve you after 2.15pm.

This is a tricky one for me. I work in a local, independent business and so for obvious reasons I agree.
But I also understand why people don't because I can't actually afford to use the place I work at regularly (without a staff discount that I obviously wouldn't get in the other independent businesses in town) and they can't afford to pay me more.
Without people using the business I work in I wouldn't have a job, but in turn even with that job I can't afford to support the local independent butcher, bakery etc because although the quality is better, I can't afford it, I have to use cheaper, poorer quality stuff.
I don't know what the answer is!

Too expensive and never have the stuff I need in stock so I wait for weeks on end. Much happier with cheaper and next day delivery

I agree - I always use my local bookshop, because if I don't it will close. We used to have 2 bookshops, the second is a coffee shop now.

I enjoy the whole experience of shopping in that bookshop, and the handiness of having it there when I need to get a present. And they pay tax and employ people who live in my town.

We've've lost the hardware shop and can't get a key cut now, and so many of my neighbours think it's a real pity, but don't seem to get the link with the Amazon vans at their homes.

We need to stop going for the cheapest possible deal, as a pp said, a lot of people are using the cost of living crisis as an excuse to put cost over everthing else, and it impacts on how our communities work, and whether they even feel like communities anymore.

I've just stopped buying more stuff in general and not just because of the cost of living crisis.

Especially after watching Buy Now: The Shopping conspiracy (Netflix).

Since I've retired I do support local businesses. Dogs get groomed by a lady who only started up after lockdown. I like to buy eggs from a small farm shop. I buy a coffee from a small independent shop and it's no more expensive than Starbucks and she sells homemade cakes her Mother makes for her to sell which are delicious. I take a slice of coffee cake home for DH quite often because it's his favourite. I agree the NIC increases and higher business rates being charged for premises are going to cripple small businesses. I wish RR would pick on very large organisations and not the small independent traders.

I'd agree that ideally people would do this but small businesses don't make it easy.

Our village butcher is only open 9-4 during weekdays and until 1pm on a Saturday. Clearly they have enough customers to not plan to change that, but it's only feasible because they're in an affluent village with a lot of people who are at home during the daytime. My friend's husband worked for a similar shop in a town and they folded because they couldn't get the custom, and blamed the supermarkets rather than their stupid hours.

I wouldn’t fly a union jack flag at my house (!) but I would buy British. I think they mean v different things!

I’m lucky enough to have a terrific independent coffee shop at the top of my road, and they’re always busy.

I splashed out on really gorgeous curtains & lampshades from local independents when I bought my flat & I’ve just been to my local Italian deli, where I can practise my Italian at the same time as buying panforte for my dad & porcini mushrooms for me.

The local Turkish grocery is always packed & has amazing ranges of spices etc.

There are limits though, for a lot of everyday stuff it’s still far easier & quicker to go to the big supermarket round the corner. I stopped buying fruit from my local market when I saw the vendors smoking all over it.

People want quantity over quality. I hate the fact that I can't just pop to the shops & buy what I need because there are no shops anymore. Amazon isn't even that cheap now days but people like the convenience. It just means we end up with a very narrow offer & everything is samey. Look how bland high street fashion is now.

People complain about low wages but don't understand how they feed into it.

I 100 %agree op but I realised that some butchers are selling products from China and bakery warm up instead of bake on site st

Thats a strange comment about privilege - I’m not advocating to start spending hundreds on deli dinners or vast bouquets of expensive blooms. It’s about thinking actually I could maybe get that small birthday gift locally rather than ordering mass produced stuff off Amazon.

You don’t have to be rich to buy from an independent business as I’m sure many of the poor independent business owners will agree.

Even if money weren't an issue (it is), time definitely is.

The small, independent shops around here are all open weekdays 9-5, with the very odd one doing Saturday mornings 9-12. I work during those times and Saturday morning is when my children are in clubs. So by the time I get to go into town (usually weekly to use the library, which opens until 4pm on a Saturday) those shops are mostly closed. I do support the local market when it's around.

I'd love to be able to go to the antique shop or the butcher's, but they're always closed. The barbers, chain coffe shops, nail shops and vape shops are open until 6-8pm weekdays and Saturdays and many are open 10-4 Sundays, too. No wonder they get more trade.

The only people able to go during shop opening hours are either pensioners or those on benefits. The odd shift worker and SAHP, too. Neither category of shoppers are exactly made of cash.

I won’t miss those gift shops that sell random overpriced items that if given as a gift the recipient would assume you know nothing about them.