Sixty per cent of Canadians say they have spent less at small businesses during the pandemic, 59 per cent that they have relied more on big box stores and online retailers. This data comes from a Maru/Matchbox opinion poll conducted for the Canadia Federation of Independent Business (CFIB).
Despite not putting their money where their mouths are, 87 per cent of those surveyed say they wish they could do more to support small businesses in their community.
“With Alberta fully reopening on July 1, we have a big opportunity to show our small business the love and support they desperately need,” said CFIB’s Alberta provincial affairs director Annie Dormuth.
On the eve of restrictions being removed, 77 per cent of Alberta businesses are fully opened, an uptick of 6 per cent from the week before. Forty-seven per cent say they are fully staffed, but only 38 per cent are making normal sales.
“Small businesses are relieved that the worst of the COVID storm seems to be behind us, but for many of them the clean-up, including dealing with piles of debt, is daunting and exhausting in a new way,” said CFIB Executive Vice President Laura Jones.
CFIB is running the#SmallBusinessEveryDay contest to encourage Canadians to support small business,
To enter, consumers can go to SmallBusinessEveryDay.ca and send a thank you message to a small business. The message gets relayed to the business and the consumer is entered to win a cash prize of $2,000 plus gift cards from Scotiabank, eBay, Mastercard and Dairy Queen.
If selected, the nominated small business wins $10,000, plus the gift cards.
In addition to the weekly big cash prize of $10,000, Microban 24 is also offering bonus cash prizes to help small businesses reopen safely; 100 bonus prizes of $2,400 from Microban 24 will be drawn among all nominated businesses at the end of the contest.
“This contest gives consumers an easy way to say thank you and support small businesses with the added bonus of possibly winning some money to shop local,” Jones said. “It’s a win-win and last year businesses were so moved by the nominations of their customers.”
