Let's pull together

I have been talking to local businesses scrambling to try and figure out how to stay in business. For most business owners, if we can qualify for part of the $2 trillion bailout through the Small Business Administration it will be a temporary bandage, but we still have to be able to stay in business and pay that back. There is part of these loans that they are saying will be forgiven if we can keep from laying people off, which makes sense. To keep as many people employed as possible is very important. Then I wonder, “how do we as a country pay off that $2 trillion debt?”

While some businesses are booming, like the toilet paper industry and grocery stores, a lot of retail, restaurant and publishing businesses have to figure out how to do things differently. I saw a local flower shop with a sign promoting free delivery of flowers locally. Great idea.

Restaurants responded by marketing takeout, which is perfect. Doing more online is key, which was coming anyway, but some people enjoy the experience of shopping and talking to local shopkeepers.

Village News immediately started creating online webinars to help businesses strengthen their online presence while they may be quarantined. That is a great use of time. We also, for our own survival, started asking the community to support us with subscriptions. Thankfully, we have received about a hundred, which is great and very encouraging. I read every subscription and am so thankful for each one. We are still hoping for several hundred more.

Our sister paper Valley News was also accepted into Rite Aid and CVS stores in the Valley which will be helpful for our distribution during this shutdown and afterward. Again, things are changing and the sun is still rising every morning and we still live in one of the best places on earth. We are blessed.

If you are a business owner or manager and want to participate in our free webinars with digital experts that will help you increase your online presence, compete, generate leads online and protect your reputation, just go to https://reedermedia.lpages.co/rm-webinar

and sign up.

It’s hard as a business owner to know what to do more than just posting a few times on Facebook, and there is so much more available than that. It’s what we do, and we are ready to help. Our goal is to help our local businesses survive and use this time to come back stronger. This is free, and we will be sending out reports specifically generated for you so you can see how your business shows up online.

We have survived fires and economic disasters before. We can survive this challenge too, if we support each other.

P.S. if you haven’t subscribed, please go to https://www.villagenews.com/subscribe.

Julie Reeder can be reached by email at [email protected].