When I was a kid, I wanted to change the world.

I wasn’t sure exactly how, but I wanted to do something that would save lives, inspire millions, change the course of history.

As I’ve gotten older, my focus has gotten smaller. It’s not that I think changing the world is impossible, but rather, I think about it as a community activity rather than a global one. I have learned how small decisions add up. And I have learned how on an individual level, we can all have impact.

So then the question I need to answer for myself becomes: what am I doing? What impact am I driving?

Around 8 years ago, I started working at a financial company. It was there that I started to think critically about the impact small businesses have on their local economies. Fast forward several years, and we all got to see this play out amid the COVID pandemic. It showed us firsthand the way our communities collapse when our local businesses grind to a halt (and sometimes, consequently go under).

And as we’ve continued to rebuild in the ongoing fallout, an increasing number of people have elected to intentionally focus on supporting their area’s businesses — because it’s easy to see that when small businesses succeed, we all do.

If asked, I’d wager most people would say they agree buying local is important.

American Express’ 2022 Small Business Economic Impact Study found that for every $1 spent with a local business, over two-thirds ($0.68) stays in the local community. That’s something called the multiplier effect — basically the lifespan of a dollar spent. The more we keep locally, the more our money directly benefits our communities.

When you make a purchase at a local business, your money helps employ local people. It goes towards local taxes, supporting local schools and local roads. And when it’s spent again at another local business, this virtuous cycle can continue.

According to SCORE’s Small Business Charitable Giving Infographic, small businesses donate an average of 6% of their profits to charitable organizations annually. Think about the nonprofits in your area; the ones you support or that support you. They also help make our economy go ’round. They might organize children’s athletics or protect the natural beauty of the area. They might be in the performing arts or help the elderly access resources. They might provide food to the hungry or conduct research on life-altering diseases.

And these local businesses might employ you.

The U.S. Small Business Administration says that small business employ 46.4% of private sector employees. From 1995 to 2021, small businesses created 17.3 million net new jobs, accounting for 62.7% of net jobs created since 1995.

Plus, according to the Andersonville Study of Retail Economics, businesses generate 70% more local economic activity per square foot than big box retail stores. In an area that has a very big real estate problem, it seems wise for us to focus on small businesses that can generate more impact with the space they have to work with.

So with all of that going for them, the real question becomes… well, why don’t we always shop local?

The answer, generally, comes down to cost and convenience. Walmart is almost always going to undercut a local business, dollar for dollar. More and more small businesses are offering shipping deals in order to compete with Amazon, but few offer two-day shipping for free. Instead of going to three different places to buy a new hat, laundry detergent, and broccolini, a few clicks of a button is a lot easier.

And sometimes, people work with what they can work with. I’m not here to shame anyone for shopping on a budget, but in an area where the median household income among the top 10% of earners has reached $534,600 per year according to the Bay Area Council Economic Institute, quite a few people here can more than afford to skip the big box stores.

And for those of us not in that 10%, I believe there are still ways we can affect change. I believe that small decisions add up. In 2022, the GDP of the San Francisco metro area amounted to about $654.73 billion-with-a-b. We’re currently the 4th largest metro area by GDP in the U.S. That’s a lot of economic power we wield.

There are lots of ways to define this effort, and instead of getting bogged down in the semantics of small and local (…yet), I instead would rather focus on the big picture, because doing something is better than doing nothing. I will be imperfect. It is very difficult in the advent of globalization to truly operate exclusively locally — but I’ll do my best.

This is a blog about my efforts to focus more of my money on my immediate community: the California Bay Area. I’d love it if you joined me.