Local Businesses and Residents Unchain Austin for a Day

On Saturday, November 15, the Austin Independent Business Alliance (AIBA) asked central Texas residents to forego chain store shopping for one day in favor of local merchants. And, according to Steve Bercu, owner of BookPeople and president of AIBA, the innovative event, called Austin Unchained, was "a dramatic success." So successful, he reported, that "10 new business members joined the business alliance in the past two days … based on the publicity" the event garnered. AIBA now has 215 members.

AIBA members organized Austin Unchained to demonstrate that even one day of shopping at locally owned businesses would have a significant economic impact on the city of Austin. In conjunction with the event, AIBA had commissioned "An Analysis of the Potential Economic Impact of Austin Unchained," a study conducted by Civics Economics that indicates AIBA's expectations are correct. "The economic impact of a successful Austin Unchained event will be measured in the millions of dollars," the report said. "This is the equivalent of dozens of new jobs in our community from a single day of changed consumer behavior." (To read the complete report "An Analysis of the Potential Economic Impact of Austin Unchained," click here.)

Though Bercu told BTW that it was difficult to measure sales for the event (he did say his store had "a lot of business"), the press coverage it garnered was a significant boon for local businesses. In the week leading up to the event, "we had tons of [media] coverage -- pretty much every radio station, every television station, and all the print media in town, plus [national music magazine] Billboard had an article about it," Bercu said. Aside from attracting membership, he said the event was important "because people are talking about it…. Something that causes our community to continue to talk about the value of local businesses is a benefit -- not only to us individually as businesses, but also I think to the community."

Furthermore, in the week leading up to the event, Austin Mayor Will Wynn officially declared "November 15, 2003, as Shop Locally Owned Day." Wynn presented AIBA with a proclamation, Bercu said, a document indicating that, at the very least, the Austin mayor certainly understands the value of shopping locally.

Not only were businesses and the local government excited about the event, customers also seemed inspired, Bercu noted. "We do not have here a kind of [group]… where individuals can join as supporters of the idea [of shopping at locally owned businesses]," he explained, "but we had several people suggesting we start something like that. That they don't have businesses but they support what we're trying to do here, I thought that was good."

Already, AIBA is thinking of ways to improve the next Austin Unchained, Bercu told BTW. "This is the first time we've ever done it," he said. "We realize there are some other elements to add to it to make it even more successful next time. We need some special events, either that we each do individually in our various businesses all over town, or do we collectively do something -- we're going to think that out and put that on the table next time." He added that the alliance had not decided on the date of the second Unchained event. --David Grogan