Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the Shop Local Soldotna CARES program is reporting big numbers.
For every $200 spent shopping in Soldotna, participants received two $50 vouchers to spend at local participating businesses by the end of the year. Utilizing funds from the City of Soldotna and CARES Act funding, $200,000 was allocated to the program.
Shannon Davis with the Soldotna Chamber of Commerce said, “I did our final reporting on Friday, so I have pretty amazing numbers to share with you. We paid out just under $290,000 in Shop Local Vouchers over the course of the month of that program. Our community showed up in such a big way. We wrote just under 6,000 hand-written vouchers. We had 58 businesses who participated. We had 1,200 people come into the Soldotna Chamber of Commerce to turn in their receipts. Over the course of the program, we had 2,893 shoppers total that participated in the program. We just can’t thank the city of Soldotna enough for allowing this to partner with them on this. It was hugely impactful. We saw all of the receipts that were being turned in. We know that the program stimulated over $1,000,000 shopping in Soldotna. Thank you to everybody who partnered with us who participated and showed up to support our local businesses.”
Davis said the vouchers need to be spent by December 31st, “It’s really up to the businesses whether or not they would like to exchange the vouchers for gift certificates. I know that some businesses are doing that, but businesses aren’t required to. Make sure you spend those vouchers before the end of the year.”
The program concluded on December 16th.
