By John Vibes
The holiday season has become a very lucrative time of year for many of the big corporations that we all love to hate; and in recent years, Amazon is where most of our money ends up getting spent.
Online shopping took over because it is the most convenient option, and Amazon seems to have everything at the lowest prices, but supporting local businesses instead can have a lasting positive impact on our communities and our economy. A business owner from the UK recently spent about £100 to produce an advertisement to encourage people to buy locally this holiday season.
The advertisement was created by Tom Jones of Hafod Hardware in Wales, and featured his two-year-old son Arthur. His only actual expense in creating the advertisement was paying for the song that was used for the background music. In the short clip, Arthur can be seen working around the store and putting up Christmas decorations.
“You really see him [Arthur] developing every year from the baby to the little boy he is today. The story this year is, Christmas isn’t just for kids, [you] can all just be a kid at Christmas,” Jones said.
The video went viral as soon as it was posted to YouTube, gathering over 50,000 views in just two days.
“It has been crazy… we’ve been overwhelmed with nice emails and messages from all over the world. The underlying message… is these big companies like John Lewis, they do really well at Christmas. I understand Christmas can be a very expensive time for everyone and they need to save money where they can, but if they can afford to, just try and shop at your small independent shops and support us, it makes a big difference,” Jones explained.
Jones has been working at the shop for about ten years, but the place has been open since 1895.
“People have been coming in this morning saying congratulations… they’ve been bringing in bottles of champagne for us to say well done. The locals are incredible, they’re our bread and butter, we’re very lucky to have the community we have here in Rhayader,” Jones said.
John Vibes is an author and journalist who takes a special interest in the counter culture, and focuses solutions-oriented approaches to social problems. He is also a host of The Free Your Mind Conference and The Free Thought Project Podcast. Read More stories by John Vibes
This article was sourced from Truth Theory.