Eastern Kentucky Local-Motive Alliance
The resources page is being updated often, recently we added links to three new sets of reports at the county level produced by Community and Economic Development In Kentucky (CEDIK) at the University of Kentucky.
Show your love and “Think Local” when shopping this Valentine’s Day. Join our "Loving Local" campaign and share your love with all our Eastern Kentucky's local businesses.
February is here and The Eastern Kentucky Local Motive Alliance has love on its mind… Love for our locally-owned and independent businesses, that is! Join our first annual “Loving Local” campaign by sending your favorite locally-owned businesses a Valentine’s Day Card. You are invited to mail your own cards (better yet hand-deliver your card during your next visit) or use The Eastern Kentucky Local Motive Valentine’s Day Cards available for you to download and print for free HERE.
Let’s look at Valentines 2012 by the numbers:
$126.03: The average expected amount, per person, that Americans will shell out for the holiday. That’s up 8.5% from 2011.
72 million: The average number of Valentine’s cards purchased by parents (40% of all cards sold). 65% of all gifts will take the form of a greeting card.
82%: The portion of people who said they’d like an “experience” rather than a gift for the romantic holiday. What these “experiences” entail, and how expensive they are, is unclear.
8 billion: The number of Sweethearts Conversation Hearts manufactured each year by the New England Confectionery Company.
15%: The estimated portion of women who will send themselves flowers.
The National Retail Federation predicts couples will spend an average of $68.98 on their significant other or spouse, up about 9% from $63.34 last year. In addition, the average person will spend $5.04 on Valentine’s gifts for their pets, up a significant 54% from $3.27 last year.
Consumers will also spend an average of $6.30 on friends (up 17% from $5.37), $4.97 (up 16% from $4.29) on classmates and teachers, and $3.41 (up 20% from $2.84) on co-workers.
U.S. Consumers will spend $3.5 billion on jewelry this Valentine’s Day, up almost 17% from an estimated $3 billion last year. Clothing ($1.6 billion, 7% higher than $1.5 billion in 2010) and dining out ($3.4 billion, up 3% from $3.3 billion in 2010) will also be popular gift options.
Greeting cards will be the most popular gift option (52.1%, up 10% from 47.2%), jewelry is expected to be a big hit as well, with 17.3% planning on buying jewelry, up 6% from 15.5% last year.
Where will all this shopping take place? The National Retail Federation suggests discount stores (36.6%) will be the most popular shopping destination, but department stores (30.5%), specialty stores (19.4%) and online (18.1%) will share much of the holiday traffic as well. Others will shop their local florist (16.8%) and jewelry store (9.5%).
Source: National Retail Federation (http://www.nrf.com/)
The "Local Motive Express" is now available.
In this first episode we sit down with Michael Shuman and talk about local economic development, think local first movements and what supporting local means for communities in the future. We also host Sharon Snowden in our "Network Focus" feature she shares with us some of her thoughts about being a local business in Eastern Kentucky.
The Holiday Season is here....
Join our “Shift Your Shopping” campaign!
We, as consumers, are about to collectively spend a large portion of our annual shopping budget this holiday season between November 1st and December 31st.
Join us in shifting these dollars to locally owned, independent businesses. If you join us, we can generate 2-3 times as much economic activity in our communities than if we had spent all of our money at a national chain or online.
Wondering how you can get involved in the "Shift Your Shopping" campaign this holiday shopping season ?
Consumers: Share the “Shift Your Shopping” message and support local businesses this holiday season. Attempt to spend at least 10% of your shopping budget at local establishments this season.
Businesses: We have created two items just for you! Below you will find links to your “Shift Your Shopping” poster and post cards. Feel free to download and print them. We suggest making the post cards available to customers and don't forget to print a poster for your storefront.
Let us know if you hear our public service announcement on the radio in your community. We had over 30 radio stations in the Eastern Kentucky Region airing the message you can play HERE.
You can find our "Shift Your Shopping" downloads below.
The Eastern Kentucky Local Motive Alliance is made possible by funding provided by the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation. Find out more at http://www.mrbf.org/. Thank you!
