Saturday marked a busy day for the Downtown Mall as shoppers participated in Small Business Saturday and this year’s first Holiday Market.
Many individual retailers on the Downtown Mall have participated in Small Business Saturday, spearheaded by American Express, in the past. Mary Beth Schellhammer, owner of My Chocolate Shoppe, helped organize a community-wide effort to encourage shoppers to support local businesses this year after seeing another community band together.
“The day after Small Business Saturday last year I went to Staunton, and they had the whole town plastered with Small Business Saturday,” Schellhammer said. “I thought it was the coolest thing.”
Upon her return to Charlottesville, Schellhammer contacted American Express to learn more about the initiative, and eventually helped organize the “Passport Program” with 20 stores on the Downtown Mall.
The Passport Program gives a punch card to customers to be stamped with a different design after purchasing from a participating store. After receiving at least seven punches, customers could turn in their card and enter into a raffle for one of three gift baskets, filled with merchandise from retailers.
Megan Giltner, the manager of Derriere de Soie, said the store was very excited to participate with other small businesses.
“We wanted to do something collaborative with local retailers for Small Business Saturday,” Giltner said. “We wanted to lean in further and promote each other.”
Schellhammer and Giltner both stated most stores saw an increase in customers this Saturday compared to last year’s Small Business Saturday.
“I think everybody said that they had a better Small Business Saturday this year than last year,” Schellhammer said.
Saturday was also the first Holiday Market of the season, which will run on Saturdays from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. from Nov. 28 through Dec. 19. The Holiday Market is a few years younger than the City Market, which, according to estimates, makes it about 30 years old, Market Master Stephanie Anderegg-Maloy said.
The Holiday Market is very similar to Charlottesville’s City Market, with many vendors participating in both markets. The biggest difference between the two is “less farmers,” Anderegg-Maloy said.
“There’s more crafts and wreaths and holiday-themed things along with a lot of the same vendors that do the City Market,” Anderegg-Maloy said.
Anderegg-Maloy said there is a variety of unique food and gifts available at the Holiday Market.
“If you’re going to shop for the holidays, it’s much better to get something that’s homemade, rather than something that anyone in the country can get,” Anderegg-Maloy said.
Organizers of both the Holiday Market and Small Business Saturday emphasized the importance of supporting local businesses. By shopping at local businesses, customers are essentially investing their money back into their community, as well as supporting what makes Charlottesville unique.
“This is such a great central place for everyone to shop and eat and be entertained by different bands and groups,” Schellhammer said. “It’s something that’s going away in every state — everything’s turning into franchises. It’s important that we rally the community to save the Mom and Pop stores.”
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