It’s Small Business Saturday – shop local!

The state’s leading small-business association today is encouraging everyone in Indiana to reserve some of their holiday shopping time and money for Small Business Saturday today.

“Small business has faced unprecedented challenges the past 18 months. From mandated shutdowns and layoffs to record job openings and supply chain issues, Indiana has seen many mom-and-pop shops forced to shut their doors,” said Barbara Quandt, NFIB State Director in Indiana. “Small business Saturday is a wonderful opportunity for Hoosiers to recognize all that small business has done for our community: they create local jobs, sponsor youth baseball teams and are gathering sports for important family events.

“While we should be supporting small businesses every day of the year, Small Business Saturday is an important reminder why shopping local is important. As we continue to struggle with the pandemic, we should also continue to keep small business in mind and do as much as we can to support our community businesses this holiday season.”

Some of the recent struggles small-business owners are facing thanks to the health and economic challenges brought on my the COVID-19 pandemic include:

In its latest Jobs Report, released this month, NFIB recorded 49% of its membership reporting job openings they could not fill despite the record high in pay they were offering.

Also this month, NFIB released the latest findings of its special COVID-19 polls showing 62% of small-business owners saying supply-chain disruptions are worse now than three months ago and 90% expecting the problem to continue for the next five months or longer.

Equally troubling, NFIB’s Small Business Economic Trends report found the percentage of small-business owners expecting better business conditions falling four points to a net negative 37%. This indicator has declined 17 points over the past three months to its lowest level since November 2012.

As U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said at a recent Fed Listens session. “I’ve never seen these kinds of supply-chain issues, never seen an economy that combines drastic labor shortages with lots of unemployed people.” 

Quick Facts

Established during the recession by American Express in 2010 and officially co-sponsored by the U.S. Small Business Administration since 2011, fully 70% of consumers are now aware of Small Business Saturday, according to a 2019 Small Business Saturday Consumer Insights Survey by AMEX and NFIB.

Last week, the research firm Morning Consult found, “Almost 4 in 10 U.S. consumers say they will do the majority of their holiday shopping online: Another 36% plan to evenly split their holiday shopping between stores and online. Only 1 in 4 consumers will do the majority of their holiday shopping in stores.

“About 50% of those who have started shopping have faced supply chain issues. These include items being out of stock online (48%), in store (48%) or back-ordered or delayed (46%).”

For more than 75 years, NFIB has been advocating on behalf of America’s small and independent business owners, both in Washington, D.C., and in all 50 state capitals. NFIB is nonprofit, nonpartisan, and member-driven. Since our founding in 1943, NFIB has been exclusively dedicated to small and independent businesses, and remains so today. For more information, please visit nfib.com.