Michael Whitney's new website has a striking image at the top of his home page when you visit www.loveourlocals.ca.
It reads, "Your favourite local restaurant might close forever. Help save North Bay businesses today."
Where the word "restaurant" sits, other businesses such as gym, museum, mall, café, and salon scroll in to create the message that all these local businesses are feeling the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
"The initial message that I have on the website is eye-grabbing," said Whitney.
"People don't really think of the impact of how this pandemic is going to affect them long term, and a lot of these small businesses cannot support themselves and their employees without any income or revenue, so having this message is eye-catching to the individual going to the website and it gets them thinking how they can support a local business.
"So why not purchase a gift certificate which you could use now or at a later date when the business is fully operational again?"
According to the Canadian Survey on Business Conditions, prepared by Statistics Canada and the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, out of 13,000 businesses surveyed, 53.5 per cent experienced a decrease in revenue of more than 20 per cent between the first quarter of 2019 and the first quarter of 2020.
Of respondents, 38.1 per cent have reduced staff hours or shifts, and 40.5 per cent have laid off staff since the onset of the pandemic.
Whitney, who is a web designer at Clark Communications, started the initiative as a side project. He got the idea from some other websites that had been created to help connect businesses to the public.
"It is basically a platform where people can go online and connect the consumer to the business owner directly," explained Whitney.
"From there, the business owner can respond with how to receive gift certificates, or some people are actually requesting items, so it is pretty cool to see that expanding during this time."
The project does have some challenges, though, especially when Whitney realized some businesses did not have online stores or gift certificates specifically.
"So I thought it was best to just foster the connection directly to the business owners' email," said Whitney.
"I have received a lot of feedback from business owners in North Bay and it has been nothing but positive feedback, so that is great to see."
Whitney said he thought it is the least he could do during this crisis.
"I think I am a helpful person and so I try to give as much as I can."
This story originally appeared on BayToday.ca.
