Sean Fisher: UC student’s site helps people buy locally
Sean Fisher loves Cincinnati, and he wants to see its unique businesses thrive.
An urban studies major at the University of Cincinnati, he and a friend, Kurt Myers, started BuyCincy.com, a Web site that serves as a network for local businesses. Though the site is now operated “out of the goodness of my heart,” they’d like it to become the place to find information on local businesses.
HOW DID THE idea of BuyCincy come about?
With the renovation that’s going on in Over-the-Rhine, all the excitement in the Gateway Quarter, I’ve been spending a lot of time there and probably more money than I should. But it’s gotten me thinking about how much vibrancy that brought to the area and how that could not be rivaled by some chain stores coming into this area and doing this same thing.
I have an environmental background, so we consume a lot of local food stuff and things that are locally made. I got to thinking about how those are filtered down to local stores, and they don’t make it to the national chains. I saw the opportunity to bring this to light for a lot of people in Cincinnati, who just go to whatever’s closest, convenient with the biggest parking lot, and make them think twice about visiting their local store down the block.
YOU WERE SHOPPING at a lot of these places before starting the site. How did you approach the business owners?
I’ve known Dan (Korman) at Park + Vine since he opened, and I ran a couple of things by him. And I knew the owners of Metronation by face, and so I went in and said, “Hey, I’m doing this.” And I started with them and they referred me to a few other stores that might be interested.
After I got a base, I was able to go into other stores.
WHY DO YOU THINK it’s important to support small businesses?
On the site, I have a sort of manifesto on buying local. But No. 1 is probably keeping the uniqueness of the city and what’s special about Cincinnati instead of bringing in monolithic, faceless corporations – to keep the Skylines and the Graeters, not to mention the Park + Vines and things that you can’t find in any other city.
If you go to Myra’s (Dionysus), it’s Myra’s. You’re in Clifton. It’s a special place.
The second part of it is the economic effect that it has on the city. With a lot of the big boxes, maybe 20 to 40 percent of the money will be kept in the community; with local stores that’s more like 70 to 90 percent. It’s really helped revitalize Cincinnati from a grass-roots level.
WHERE DO YOU see the future of your Web site?
Hopefully, growing into the No. 1 resource that people would go to when they’re interested in local shops in Cincinnati. … I hope it becomes a resource for other stores to get together and say, “Maybe we can get our cleaning supplies from Park + Vine or our office furniture from this store” and have everyone supporting the local economy.
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