Buy Local, For Locals!

By: Gavin Balakrishnan, McKenzie Talley, Irene Duong, and Matthew Volz

Its Good for the Economy

When you spend $1,000,000 at Powells Books, how much do you invest in the people in your community? $81,818.18*

When you spend $1,000,000 at Wal-Mart, how much do you invest in the people in your community?
$5.36*

*see references and math page

Its Good for the Environment

A Wal-Mart semi truck burns 5.72 gallons of diesel fuel travelling from Saint Helens to Portland 1-way. How much CO2 would a weekly delivery of goods by one truck to a Wal-Mart store in Portland create in one year? 6.66 tons of CO2 A local farmer out of Sherwood U-Pick Farm attends a Farmers Market in Portland every week. His Ford F250 burns .94 gallons diesel 1-way to Portland. How much CO2 would this farmer create in one year? 1.05 tons of CO2 Greenhouse gases anyone?

Its Good for the People

46 percent of people that work for Wal-Mart have to either rely on government benefit or go without health insurance for their children New budget cuts in Wal-Mart increased deductibles on their in-house health insurance policies, nearly to the point their employees cannot afford it.

Meanwhile, Powells Books offers full healthcare coverage and 401k retirement package for their full-time employees.

The Triple Bottom Line

For the good of the economy, For the good of the environment, For the good of the people, Buy Local, For Locals!

References

http://www.commondreams.org/ http://www.job-applications.com/powells-books-application/

http://www.eia.gov/
http://www.referenceUSA.com http://web.ebscohost.com.proxy.lib.pdx.edu

To get the numbers on slide 2, we took the average employees salary at the company, divided by the companys gross sales, multiplied that by the average number of employees at a single location, and then to get a decent number multiplied by $1,000,000. This number gives us the effective return on investment to the community when you buy at a store location.