#mylocalshop
The Problem
How might we encourage small business consumption?
Through several iterations, the problem evolved to address the diminished support for local and small businesses from an increased use of e-commerce and increased support for large enterprises
My Role
Malak El-Dirdiry, Chelsea Hernandez, and I elaborated on a class project to bring a conceptual solution to life. Over the course of two years, the team worked vigorously with the city of Davis, CA in an attempt to bring awareness of local shops to its residents
Background
Davis, CA is a town situated near the state’s capitol. Although small, it prides itself in it’s liberal and progressive perspectives and as the home to one of the states distinguished universities. The team had observed that many of our peers hadn’t heard, visited, or shopped at the countless businesses in a small college town. We were curious why.
Research
Discussion Guide
Our initial round of research began by walking into local businesses and asking for a couple minutes with the owners. Our discussion guide covered their experiences as business owners and their business trends for the past years, going into detail about their stories. We also talked to students about their consumption behaviors, specifically local behaviors.
Interviews
We interviewed six small business owners about their experiences starting and continuing to grow and maintain their businesses. Each shared their story, their hardships, and their concerns for the future. Claire's story struck our team deeply.
What's Claire's Story?
Claire owns a boutique gift shop in Davis, CA. Her happiness comes from serving her community as she helps her customers find unique gifts. She's owned her space for the past 17 years. Claire has become increasingly concerned about keeping her shop in business. The amount of customers has significantly decreased, especially her presence in the younger community who once relied on her shop for small knick knacks.
Insights
Students don’t know about small businesses in Davis and instead buy gifts online
Customer visits are diminishing for student populations, a majority of the town’s customers.
How might we better support our local small businesses and promote genuine human interaction within our community?
Concept
Small business festival where businesses don’t pay, but are exposed in one space to the community in a manner that allows them to sell and offer their services.
Testing
The team went to local businesses with paper prototypes and sketches of the experience. They expressed how it already existed (hosted by the Chamber of Commerce, a sore subject), costed money to participate, and didn’t make economic sense to close shop for a festival where everyone expects freebies.
Planning of the small business festival, which serves as a networking and business growth (customers and institutional) opportunity
Reality Check
We soon realized the concept didn’t answer the root of the problem. "So what can you do for me…," Claire continues, "Can you get rid of online shopping?!" That was the golden nugget.
Eliminating online shopping. Impossible. So our team mined that golden nugget and discovered that students had the following:
Lack of knowledge of local small businesses,
Associated lower costs with larger businesses,
Associated lower risk with larger businesses.
Concept Development
Our team dissected the difference of shopping online and shopping at small shops. Genuine human interaction, meaningful experiences, and helpful advice. The factors overlook genuine human interaction. Instead, students were seeking low costs, assurance of stock, credibility by others, and recommendations by others. As we discovered through Davis businesses, small businesses can be competitively priced, will resupply if demanded, are trustworthy due to the sophisticated nature of their business models, and are recommended by local, longterm residents (who students rarely interact with).
Example of a street pole banner featuring Konditorei
Solution
A movement that supports local and small businesses, by encouraging shopping small and shopping local. #mylocalshop highlights the stories of the businesses and works within the local community to create a playful discovery of local shops.
Parts of the movement include street banners, road vinyls directing a “scavenger hunt”, and pictures that carry the genuine experience that shopping small and shopping local brings.
Challenges
Accepting that our first idea wasn’t the right solution meant rethinking the problem with a limited timeframe.
We worked with city officials to get our idea of street banners implemented, but pulled out of the conversation when they, and the Chamber of Commerce, asked us to set aside the core values of the project.
Moving Forward
Continue to support local and small businesses and wait for a time when we can implement our idea and not give up our core values.