Off To Work With Local Business Promoters
When Sheridan Helms, a local woman, and Al Squitieri, originally from New York, put their collective talents together, they’re urging people to “buy local.”
It’s not a new idea. Many decades ago, local chamber of commerce types fretted when Annistonians hopped on the train to go do their shopping in Birmingham. They hated it when “chain stores” set up shop.
But Helms and Squitieri are putting an Internet twist on the idea. Working out of a home base in Oxford, they go off to work to find new ways to persuade the online consumer to keep his or her dollars concentrated in brick-and-mortar stores of Calhoun County.
Helms and Squitieri represent an online business entity known as RelyLocal. As a national movement it’s a couple of years old. Helms and Squitieri set up their local “chapter” of it, so to speak, in November.
It’s a membership program for any Calhoun County-based business, which for $25 a month gets exposure on www.RelyLocal.com.
