Twyla Sickmiller, owner of 308 Bistro, in the Old North State Winery building, shows off her “Give Your Heart to Haiti” collection box, which is a program in conjunction with other downtown businesses to not only raise awareness about Haiti, but to also educate consumers about shopping locally.
This month may be the month for love with Valentine’s Day, but downtown businesses are also hoping that customers will show their love by giving money to the relief effort in Haiti.
“Give Your Heart to Haiti” is the name of the program that will help the Downtown Business Association raise money for disaster victims.
Amy Slate, a member of the Downtown Business Association, said the project is in conjunction with The 3/50 Project and its Valentine’s campaign to raise awareness not only about Haiti, but also small businesses who are falling victim to the economy.
The 3/50 Project encourages consumers to spend $50 per month in three locally-owned stores or businesses.
“They have a special Valentine’s promotion called, ‘Small businesses have big hearts,’ so the DBA is adopting that. People will see posters in all of our windows with the saying. Also, we are taking up donations, because we are giving our hearts to Haiti. A lot of the participating businesses have boxes in their stores,” Slate said.
She is hoping that customers will drop their spare change into the boxes, and at the end of February, the money will be collected and donated to a Haiti relief effort.
The 3/50 Project is a shop-local concept, Slate said.
“The idea is to save the brick-and-mortar stores in small towns. ‘Save your local economy three stores at a time’ is their motto, so we are encouraging people to think about which three businesses in your hometown that you would be sad to see go out of business. Make it a point to go in and see what those business have and what’s going on and hopefully purchase something from them that you might be tempted to buy elsewhere,” Slate said.
She said right now merchants are in the process of getting the word out in the community about the project.
“Nationwide, it is really growing — the whole concept,” Slate said.
As the owner of Scarlet Begonias on Main Street, Slate recently attended a conference in Atlanta, Ga., where the founder of The 3/50 Project, Cinda Baxter, was a speaker.
“The whole movement is starting to take off,” Slate said.
More information can be found at www.the350project.net.
Contact Mondee Tilley at mtilley@mtairynews.com or at 719-1930.
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