Shop Local Delmarva app goes live

 From Shop Local Delmarva Facebook page:

Sneak peek of the new Shop Local Delmarva app

Here's your first look at what to expect with the new Shop Local Delmarva app in pictures.  Please keep in mind the app you will see tomorrow is not the finished product.  It is the foundation for a project that will be in work for at least the next ten years.  Your feedback is important to shape how the app will grow and adapt to your needs.  What you will get tomorrow is Shop Local Delmarva 1.0.  You will shape its future versions as the Shop Local Delmarva community grows.  

Please note as you browse through the pictures, all businesses you see are fictional and were test businesses in developing the app.  They will not be listed in the live version being released tomorrow.

First up is the warm up page.  As the app downloads the directory, you'll see the place holder page with the new name, The Original Shop Local Delmarva.  Since I didn't hold onto my Shop Local Delmarva name and website from eleven years ago (that would've cost a lot of money), someone else now uses the name and .com website that goes with it.  I had to rebrand my business name (adding "The Original") and change the website, that will be coming sometime in the future, to .org instead of .com.  There is a .com website out there, but it is not affiliated with the app or the work I started fifteen years ago.

Once everything loads up, first time users will have the option to sign up as a user or business owner (vendor).  Users can create a personalized account or simply use the app as a guest.  Business owners, however, will be required to set up an account.  Don't worry.  It's free to sign up and maintain a business account.  Once you've set up an account (user or business owner), you won't see this page any more.  The app remembers who you are.

You will next be taken to the page that greets you every time you open the app after being set up.  The app will load the businesses within a five-mile range of where you are currently located.  You will need to have your location activated for this to be accurate.

The important feature on this page is the search field.  Of course you can search by business name, but the most helpful tool will be the three transit line menu in the right hand side of the search bar.  There are two sets of filters.  One sets the distance radius to search from zero to fifty miles out.  The other filter searches by category and subcategory of the business.

The miles slide bar is self explanatory.  If you want to search all businesses by miles only, you're done.  Click the "apply filter" button.

The category filter is also self explanatory.  You get to select one main category and then the subcategory becomes active.  The subcategory is tailored to each main category and so will be different for each main category.  You can select as many subcategories as you like.  Click the "Apply Filter" button and all businesses meeting your search requirements will be shown.

Please note you can use both filters at the same time.  For example, you can search for retail (main category) businesses in a 15-mile radius of your location that are nurseries/garden centers, roadside stands, or florists that offer loyalty programs or rare and exotic plants.

As a business owner, you will want to take advantage of the category and subcategories.  Category and subcategories are how most people will find you.  All business owners get to pick one category.  Paid subscriptions determine how many subcategories you can pick to describe your business.

When you select a business, you'll see the details of the business.  The one pictured below is the Heron level subscription.  It has the most features available.  Subscription levels range from Shorebird (free) through Oriole (a bit more options, yet affordable) to Osprey (even more options) to Heron (the most options).

Since the app is new, Shorebird and Oriole are the best options to select.  We need a sizable directory to attract users, so I wanted to make the subscriptions attractive and affordable.  The Osprey and Heron levels are competitively priced for the features they offer but not cost effective right now.  The nice thing, though, is as the app grows, business owners can change their subscriptions at any time.  If by summer, for example, we have 500 businesses in the directory and 10,000+ users, the business owner can easily change their subscription to the level with more features to attract more customers than a basic free Shorebird or Oriole level can attract.

If you click on "Profile" in the lower right hand corner, you'll see your personalized account (means you can add your picture), but more importantly, you can find all the important fine print.  

And there you have it, the buck ninety-nine tour of the Shop Local Delmarva app.

Right now the app is only available for android phones.  The iOS phone availability is coming at a later date.  As a business owner, though, you don't need an android phone to add your business to the directory.  Tomorrow I will be posting a landing page where all businesses owners can load their business information.  It's a lot easier to upload the information from a desktop or laptop than on the tiny screen of a phone.  Also, the link to the landing page will be accessible in the right hand column of this page.

Shop Local Delmarva Day this Saturday

The second Saturday of every month is Shop Local Delmarva Day.  If everyone were to shift their spending by 10% towards our locally owned and operated businesses, the local economy would see a boost to the tune of $350 million new revenue and fifty to one hundred new jobs created. 



Old habits die hard

<sigh> Old habits die hard.

Almost two months ago, I realized that supporting our locally owned and operated businesses can mean more than just stopping in a local business once in awhile. Every Saturday, I buy beer, and it's always Budweiser, in a bottle. I have a few decades-long brand loyalty to Bud. When I asked for suggestions to switch to a comparable locally produced beer, Lee Weldon, ...a strong supporter of this site and manager of Habitat ReStore, suggested National Premium, the favorite old beer that has gained new life through the efforts of the owner in Easton. (In fact, I had an interesting learning tour of the efforts of entreprenuers across the country bringing back the old brands of various products that had long since disappeared off our shelves.)

Long story short (too late, I know), National Premium is a bit more expensive than Bud, but I vowed to treat myself to a six-pack every once in awhile. After a long day at work (only a ten-hour day, today, no breaks or lunch), I stopped at my locally owned and operated liquor store and bought...Budweiser. Just habit. Tired from a long day, grabbed my beer, and headed home. Cursed myself out once again for not getting the National Premium after I had gotten almost halfway home.

Yes, old habits die hard, especially when one gets up in age. I refuse to accept that I am an old dog so I am getting me a six-pack of National Premium this week even if I have to walk the thirty miles uphill, both ways, to the nearest store in subzero temps and in a raging blizzard.

Top Ten Reasons to shop local for the holidays

10. Your only threat of being trampled is by the store owner's hound dog who may be a bit over-exuberent in greeting you.

9. Mrs. Baldwin might share her family secret recipe for that fruit cake of hers you've loved since you were a kid.

8. Mr. Baldwin might share his family secret recipe for homemade rum that goes in that fruit cake.

7. Catch up on all the news going on around town.

6. Discover that you are actually living an exciting life that's more fun-filled than Bond, James Bond's life, at least according to your neighbors and friends.

5. Don't know what to get for that person who has everything? Bet that shop around the corner has something that hard-to-shop-for person doesn't have and the national chains have never heard of it.

4. Which would you rather hear when you stop to grab a bite to eat: "You want fries with that?" or "Hey, honey, how have you been? I've heard you've been leading an exciting life lately. How are your kids?"

3. Find fresh preserves, jams, and relishes packed in real Mason Jars and send them off to your kids in the military or college. They'll think you slaved for hours in the kitchen making the special taste of home because you love them so much.

2. Sardines blindly follow each other and get packed tightly in a can. Striped bass blaze their own trail and never get packed in a can. Which do you want to be, a sardine or a striped bass?

And the number one reason to shop at your locally owned and operated businesses this holiday season:

1. Give a gift to your community. For evey $100 you spend at a locally owned and operated business, $68 remains in your community to support your friends and neighbors, sponsor a field trip for your local school club, provide after-school or summer activities through your local civic organizations, or upgrade a playground at your community park. The same $100 spent at a national chain leaves $13 in your community to achieve the same things.

Are you really shopping local?

Let's have a serious talk...even toot your own horn, if you like.

I just spent the last two hours looking at shop local videos on YouTube trying to learn what works and doesn't work. Of course, it's Saturday night and I have my Budweiser with me. Budweiser is the only beer I drink and have drank since my college days. I have sampled other beers as long as I can buy them one bottle at a time, but... when I buy to stock my fridge, Budweiser is all you will find.

Then I came across a video where a chef took to task the shop local message. His point was that consumers are driving the shop local message, but are local shop owners practicing what the consumers are preaching? Since he is a chef and owns a restaurant, he pointed out that in his restaurant he carries almost exclusively locally produced beers, wines, and spirits and he suggests them to his diners over the national brands, like Budweiser.

His comment got me thinking on three fronts.

First, as much as I push "buy local", I have been remiss on supporting our local breweries. I have a few decades of brand loyalty to Budweiser, yet I bet the folks at Budweiser couldn't find Delmarva, much less Toddville, on a map. Sure, when I first started drinking beer back in college, there was no such thing as locally produced beers, but now there is. Unless Budweiser gives back to Toddville by sending a couple of ice cold kegs via Clydesdale horses for a community crab feast every year for the next thirty years (my time investment in Budweiser so far), I need to find a comparable locally produced beer. At least I know if I spend my ten bucks every Saturday on a 12-pack of a locally produced beer, $6.80 will stay in my local community, adding to its strength and vitality it so desparately needs. That's a much better investment than the $1.30 that Budweiser leaves for my community. I do want to see those Clydesdales up close so, if Budweiser is listening, I'm willing to negotiate a year-to-year deal.

Second, if you own a restaurant or bar, how much of your inventory is locally produced beers, wines, and spirits and do you often suggest or actively advertise them, like with plenty of signage, verbal suggestions to every customers, or in printed ads?

Third, I figure I have a lot of "brand loyalty" to many basic household items, food, and drinks in addition to my brand loyalty to Budweiser. I need to take a closer look at what I am buying and try to find an acceptable, locally produced alternative. If you are a locally owned and operated business, will you join me in the quest to find locally produced alternatives your customers will love?

This is where you get to toot your own horn. If you are a locally owned and operated producer of goods, tell us. I know I need to find new brands. If you are a locally owned and operated business that sources its products locally, first, tell us. I need to know where to go to experience the true flavor of shopping local. And if you are a shopper who already knows where the great locally owned and operated businesses that offer locally produced goods are, tell us. That's a secret everyone should know!

Shop Local Delmarva encourages Dorchester to "keep it local"

Almost four years ago, I attended a Dorchester County Economic Development Plan meeting.  The meeting almost exclusively focused on a new technology park to be opened adjacent to the Bucktown Airport.  The park would hold technology focused businesses.   Much ado was made over a call center (telemarketers) opening up shop.  The park would bring in hundreds of new jobs and much needed revenue to the county.

Red flags began popping up in my head.  The park meant the loss of farmland and an influx of national companies.  National companies usually bring in their own management teams, who, in turn, usually hire people they know to fill key positions.  The end result is that few, if any, of the better paying positions would go to local residents.  The influx of "hundreds of jobs" easily translates to "hundreds of at or near minimum wage jobs".  The influx of new people from outside of Dorchester County also meant that new houses would need to be built, which means more woods and farmlands would be lost.

On a more personal, albeit less significant, note, construction of the park meant the destruction of the colorful wild hibiscus that lined both sides of Bucktown Road every summer.  Every summer I looked forward to the line of whites to red and every shade in between.  Every fall I looked forward to collecting some seeds to get the wild hibiscus to grow down here where I live.  Progress meant the annual natural beauty would be lost forever.

Construction began on the park.  The old farmhouse in the field was demolished, a paved entrance way built, and a stop sign at the end of the entrance erected, but then construction stopped about three years ago.  The colorful hibiscus are gone except for one small stretch on the opposite side of the road from the unfinished technology park.  Last week, I collected my seeds from the survivors.  With a planned ribbon cutting ceremony for the park next spring, these last few hibiscus probably grew for their last year. 

Progress can be a good thing and colorful flowers can always be replanted once a project is done.  The Dorchester County Regional Technology Park is off to a good start and appears to be headed in the right direction.  Construction of the park is being done by a locally owned and operated construction company, Willow Construction, headquartered in Easton.  Willow Construction plans on hiring local contractors to build the park. 

Hiring a local construction firm is an important step and a good sign the Dorchester County Economic Development Department's director, Keasha Haythe and her team, are "thinking local".  The task of selling the fifteen available lots, however, was given to a national firm, Cassidy Turley, headquartered in DC.  Their job is to lease the fifteen available spaces to technological start up companies.  Only time will tell how concerned Cassidy Turley is with the "think local first" philosophy when leasing the available fifteen lots.

Dorchester County has the second highest unemployment rate in the state at 10% as of July of this year.  In fact, only Dorchester and Somerset counties have double-digit unemployment rates in the entire state.  (Baltimore city, separated from Baltimore County, has the actual highest unemployment rate.)  Any development project that brings jobs should be welcomed, but the quality of those jobs should be questioned by every resident.  The price of bringing those jobs is lost farmland and woods, natural resources we won't get back, and a loss that could potentially change the very identity of Dorchester County over time.  Every member of the Dorchester County Economic Development Department, every political leader, every business leader, and every citizen of Dorchester County has a vested interest in bringing quality economic development and jobs to Dorchester, development and jobs that will enhance residents' standard of living while preserving the county's unique, rural identity.

The Dorchester County Regional Technology Park is being constructed under the One Maryland Tax Credit statute.  The idea of the statute is to encourage economic development in designated stressed areas through tax incentives.  As written, One Maryland strives to improve the living standards of residents living in depressed areas by increasing the tax base of the county and providing jobs for the residents.  The language of the statute, though, allows companies to skirt the intent of the program.

While any start up technology business looking to open its doors in Dorchester County is required to offer a minimum of twenty-five "qualified positions" (jobs), the only stipulation is that each qualified position opened nets one new job in Maryland.  What that means is a company in Delaware could relocate to Dorchester County, bring all twenty-five of its employees with them, and qualify for the tax credits.  What this means: for the state of Maryland, a gain of twenty-five new jobs; for Dorchester County, an increased tax base; for residents of Dorchester County, nothing - they are still unemployed.

It also means that a start up company in Anne Arundel County can open a branch in Dorchester County, bring as many employees as they want with them, hire replacements for the vacated positions in Anne Arundel County, and fill the remaining open positions in Dorchester County with local residents, or with anyone willing to commute to Dorchester County, and the company still meets the definition of creating one net new job for Maryland for each position filled.  What that means is the company receives its tax credit, Maryland receives a net increase in jobs, Dorchester County increases its tax base, and residents are left either unemployed or with a job opportunity starting at $10.87 per hour, the poverty level defined by the government for a family of four.

Shop Local Delmarva encourages the Dorchester County Economic Development Department and local politicians to insist the realty company seeks tenants for the fifteen available lots with Dorchester County start up companies.  The search can then expand to regional start up companies, starting with the mid-shore counties and then expanding to all of Delmarva.  If there are still lots available, the search for tenants can expand to the Western Shore of Maryland, and, if need be, to other states.

Once the search for tenants expands beyond Dorchester County, preference should be given to those companies that vow to hire more local residents than employees the company bring with them.  The One Maryland program is intended to help the residents of depressed areas so it logically follows that companies most willing to hire local residents should be given preference to open its doors in the new technology park.

When I first discussed this concept with Ms. Haythe, Director of Dorchester County Economic Development Department, about four years ago, she expressed concern that such tenancy selection procedures could be construed as discriminatory.  Shop Local Delmarva, as well as every resident of Dorchester County, needs to ask, "If the intent of a statute is to improve the economic conditions of a depressed area, how can setting guidelines (not rules or laws) to fulfill the intent of the statute be viewed as discriminatory?"  The answer, of course, is the statute, itself, is discriminatory if the depressed area has no leeway to set guidelines in an attempt to fulfill the intent of the statute.

With such an important project slated to open within the next year, possibly as early as this spring, Shop Local Delmarva encourages every resident of Dorchester County and friends of Dorchester County to contact the Dorchester County Commissioners, the Dorchester County Economic Development Department, the county manager, and the realty company, Cassidy-Turley, with their concerns to fill the technology park with local start up companies, first, and then regional companies, second,  and then outside companies willing to hire local residents, for all, or most, positions, third.

Please call and/or email the following contacts with your concerns that the technology park opens with the best interests of Dorchester County-owned businesses and Dorchester County residents' interests as the cornerstone to a successful development.

Dorchester County Economic Department:
Keasha Haythe, Director
410-228-0155
email (online): http://choosedorchester.org/contact/


County Commisioners:
Jay L. Newcomb (D)
410-397-2134
email: jaynewcomb@docogonet.com

Tom Bradshaw (R)
410-943-1212
email: tbradshaw@docogonet.com

William V. Nichols (D)
410-221-1371
email: wnichols@docogonet.com
Rick Price (R)
443-521-5518
email: rprice@docogonet.com 

Ricky Travers (D)
410-228-1532
email: travers@fastol.com

County Manager:

Jane Baynard410-228-1700
email: jbaynard@docogonet.com


Cassidy Turley (realtor for the 15 available lots):
Joseph Stettinius
202-463-1367
email: Joe.Stettinius@cassidyturley.com