Small Business Saturday just in time for Uptown Minneapolis

MINNEAPOLIS (FOX 9) – Small Business Saturday is here, and it’s coming just in time for Uptown Minneapolis.

Shopping local

Nationally, people spent $17 billion at small businesses on the day last year.

The beeps have started on a milestone weekend for Comma, A Bookshop.

Small Business Saturday is the second anniversary of the store’s opening.

“We’re doing some specials and giveaways,” said owner Victoria Ford. “We’re going to have birthday cake, we’re doing a book drive for the Queer Space Collective.”

And maybe most importantly, they’ll be doing great sales as people turn their holiday shopping focus away from big box stores and to small, local businesses.

“A day like that makes a huge difference in our overall success over the year,” Ford said. “It’s typically our second busiest day of the year.”

The boost is especially appreciated in places like Uptown, where businesses have struggled recently, and construction on Hennepin didn’t help.

Foot traffic returns 

Seven months of closures ended Tuesday.

“With the roads opening up this week and with the holidays and everything, it actually brings that regular business,” said Uptown Diner general manager Pablo Forero. “This is what it’s usually been like for us. So it’s nice to see.”

People packed the Uptown Diner for lunch Friday, but small business owners aren’t sure yet if they’re back to normal or if it’s just a holiday weekend bubble.

They know for sure a lot of the neighboring storefronts have gone vacant in the last four or five years and they’d love to see foot traffic back where it was before the pandemic.

“People were scared away for various reasons,” said Jeff Veigel, who owns Isles Bun & Coffee. “So it’s like, come back. The lakes are still here. It’s still a nice area to walk around. Still a nice area to shop and to live.”

His coffee and pastry shop — known for the frosted cinnamon twists called puppy dog tails — filled up on Friday as well, but Uptown sidewalks were mostly empty as wind chills dipped near zero.

But businesses like Isles, and Magers and Quinn, and the Uptown Diner are hoping to see big crowds for Small Business Saturday.

And that their success spills over.

Community impact

“We bring in more people and then more people come around and check out the businesses that are around us as well,” Forero said.

The U.S. Small Business Administration estimates that when you spend $100 at a small business, $48 stay in the community. 

If you spend it at a big-box store or national retailer, only $14 stays.

“We hope for more of it,” said Veigel. “We hope that people remember that year-round.”

Baking in the best-case scenario before another round of construction in 2025.