from Wired
AS MANHATTAN BRACED for lockdown in early March, the main street of Fredonia, New York, was still buzzing with activity. The town had been chosen as the location for season five of Small Business Revolution, a TV series hosted by Amanda Brinkman in which the shops in a particular community get a makeover, and filming was underway. “We wondered if Covid would end up showing up in the narrative of season five,” Brinkman mused. Now, “the entire season is going to be about how we were able to help these businesses through this crisis.” As the chief brand officer of Deluxe, a small business financial services company, Brinkman has long been devoted to helping those companies serve their communities and adapt to ever-changing commercial and digital landscapes. The coronavirus pandemic has forced many to evolve overnight or risk going under, and she’s working hard to help.
More here.
The Coronavirus Pandemic shut down many small businesses because the owners were not getting enough customers to pay for the expensive rent, not enough employees, and even a lack of employees from them being sick with the virus itself. The world has made the dependency on technology incredibly large because during Covid, jobs were making their workers work from home through the computer, schools made students attend zoom meetings along with all work be presented on online platforms, and has also made some business stray away from having a physical building to be an only online store. In this article, Amanda Brinkman explained the importance of small businesses going digital which I agree with. Social media is popular in the culture we are living in today. Instagram, a social media platform specifically has a section on the app called “Shop” which is amazing for small businesses to grow their brand even more than they would by having a physical building. Online shopping has become so ingrained in the world today because of the lockdown. During quarantine, people did not want to leave their houses in fear of getting the virus so ordering products and food online and sent to their homes was very convenient. Even though the pandemic is just about over, online shopping platforms like Amazon are still extremely popular. I used to work at Shoprite during the pandemic two years ago and they even created an option to order online and have the food delivered to your house, in which many people still do to this day. Businesses making their own website or using a platform like Instagram could be very beneficial to their company because the increase in the number of people doing online shopping has increased dramatically. Even though Brinkman encouraged this during the pandemic, I still believe small businesses can still greatly succeed by making their products available online. Online shopping is convenient and the customer can search for exactly what they want. They do not have to go through the struggle of going to the store, not finding the product or size of clothing they need, then having to order it online anyways. Having the business online is beneficial to both the consumer and producer because they can make a sale they might not have made in person and customers can see what is available at their fingertips. I enjoyed reading this article because I have been wanting to create my own brand of clothing and it was inspiring to read about how small businesses can go digital and still be successful.