Calderdale shop losing their Local Customers

The Halifax Courier ran a story in 2000 suggesting that Calderdale is West Yorkshire’s biggest loser for profit from local shoppers. the survey showed that for every £100 spent, £45 goes to businesses outside the borough, chiefly to neighbouring towns such as Leeds, Bradford, Huddersfield and Wakefield. Satellite towns - e.g. Brighouse and Todmorden - fared even worse. Elland, for example, managed to retain only about £9 out of every £100.

The usual solution is to try and encourage more tourist spending. However, Calderdale locals spend £310 million a year in shops (and only £170 million stays within the borough), compared with visitor spending of £26 million a year.

Rather than spending millions encouraging visitors to come and sample Calderdale’s delights, the obvious solution is to encourage local shopper to buy locally .

To address the problem, Calderdale Green Currency established a local currency which could be used by local people to buy and sell locally. Accepting small amounts of this currency (perhaps as part of a major ‘buy local campaign) would have enabled local businesses to increase their share of local spending and also reduced the need to compete in a price war with multinationals.

Benefits for Calderdale people:

1. No need for credit/ debit cards/ bank account - 13% - 20% of people in the north do not have bank accounts, and are thus unable to participate in the majority of today’s electrontionsm which demand a bank account or a credit card. Calderdale’s Green Currency however requires no such wizardry, and effectively enables the participation of this disadvantaged section of the community.
    
2. Retention of money within immediate borough - local currency can only be spent within the geographical boundaries of the borough, giving local people a real reason to buy locally rather than travel to Leeds and Bradford.
    
3. Creation of employment opportunities - it enables people to use their skills or time to obtain more ‘money’, which in turn can only be spent  locally.
    
4.  Environmental benefits - goods produced, bought and sold locally reduce the pollution caused by world-wide transportation of goods.