Week 5 in the life of coronavirus and Your Story.

On Friday my friend posted in our WhatsApp Group ‘I’ve bought a teeshirt this morning from the comic relief site. Nothing to spend my money on’.

I thought about this for a while and replied ‘ I’ve bought a new rug, a set of garden furniture and two bottles of Sicilian Lemon Gin that I’d seen on TV but couldn’t find in the shops’.

Don’t you find that working from home, with the same surroundings every day makes you want to change things?

Ideally, I’d like to convert my garage and lay a new patio in the garden but in the absence of that, I changed my rug and upgraded my garden furniture.

I remember at the beginning of this #lockdown thinking who is going to buy clothes to sit at home? But I can’t bear my lockdown jumpers any longer so I bought two more.

What is it? Boredom, the need to take some control back or insanity to keep on spending? However you look at it, it is good for retailers. And not just the large supermarkets who have been some of the winners during the pandemic. Local independent shops are benefiting too.

The latest statics on www.shopappy.com show a staggering 950% rise in traffic since 24th March. They have processed 10’s of 1,000’s of orders for businesses who may well have closed.

So that’s a good news story. It’s a good news story for us here at Your Story too. We have been working with Jackie and the ShopAppy team for the past 2 and a half years. We’re more integrated with the team, have a deeper understanding of their business, and are getting stuck into all aspects of their business as more towns and businesses get on board.

Since meeting Jackie we’ve shared her passion for supporting local businesses and at some points, the cause has looked bleak. As with many aspects of our daily life, the changes imposed upon us through this crisis will be for the better and if one outcome is the change in fortune for our local businesses, it will be cause for celebration.

And for me, one of the reasons I set up in business is to have the choice to work with ethical businesses who make a difference, and ShopAppy.com is certainly achieving that.

Cathy

#smallbusinesses #socialmarketing #covid19 #onboarding #shoppinglocal #whereyoushopmatters