Business : What Would YOU Do to Hold On to $32 and 30 Minutes of Your Life?

As many of you know, Vinton Unlimited is a non-profit organization, dedicated to the growth and prosperity of the Vinton Community, the residents who live here, and the businesses who serve here. Do you ever think of the businesses located in Vinton as serving YOU? The not-so-original question that every Chamber of Commerce asks their community is, “What would you do if these businesses were no longer located here?” And, of course, obvious response locally is undoubtedly, “Go to Cedar Rapids or Waterloo.” But have you ever stopped to think about what that would actually mean for your family?

Gas is $3.53 per gallon at the time this is being written. From downtown Vinton, you have to drive 32 miles one way to shop in Cedar Rapids which costs over $32 round trip at the federal rate. I assume you’re now wondering who actually uses the federal rate when figuring how much it costs to go to CR, so, for sake of argument, let’s cut it in half and call it a $16 round trip cost for your car expenses alone. Now, we’ll promptly add the $16 back to compensate for the money that is NOT circulating back into the local economy for schools, Park & Rec, city improvements, economic development, community events, and a whole host of other community improvements.

This doesn’t even include your time which is probably the most valuable asset anyone has control over. I reheated a piece of pizza the other day and watched an entire minute of my life go by staring at the microwave waiting. That bothered me. So, I got to thinking about the other things that “waste” my time. How about the time it takes to drive the 64 miles round-trip to CR to pick-up a new pair of pants or go to the dry cleaners? Now, I know that many people work in Cedar Rapids, so it actually seems more convenient to just stop by Wal-Mart on the way home, but really, even if you worked within 5 miles of the closest Wal-Mart, it’s going to take you at least 30 minutes to drive over there, “run” across their 3 acre parking lot into the store, find someone to help you find what you’re looking for, figure out how to use their “self-checkout” machine, wait for someone to fix the “self-checkout” machine because you forgot to put your item in the bag after scanning, walk back to your car, and drive away. You can be back in Vinton, buying from an actual person with a smile on their face that you might just sit next to at the baseball game next week, who is actually going to help you find exactly what you want and make sure you’re completely taken care of in that amount of time!

The final issue really just comes down to planning and time-management and who of us can’t use some help with that concept?!? So, not all of the stores are open late every day. If you haven’t noticed yet, there are more than you might think! Alco, Theisens, Fareway, and most restaurants are open past 5pm about every night. Michael & Dowd just extended their regular, daily hours and almost every store downtown is open until 8pm on Thursday nights! So, let’s try to plan ahead and “shop 2 local stores in 1 night” (a twist on the 2 birds with 1 stone thing).

We’ve been so inundated with the “Big Box” mentality that it’s tough to change our habits and go another direction, but really, isn’t $32 and 30 minutes of your life worth shopping where you live?