What is the attitude towards small businesses or entrepreneurs in your city
August 5, 2025
Is there a strong culture of supporting local businesses? Do people tend to prefer large chains, or is there pride in buying local? How easy or difficult is it to start a small business where you live?
7 comments
There is a stereotype that the owners of such businesses are greedy, eager to avoid paying taxes and unpleasant to deal with. There is a word “Januszex” but I wont even try to explain it.
I find France has a very strong support of local businesses, there’s independent bakeries and butchers etc. in every neighborhood.
My native Sweden is much more American, with mostly large chains for both stores and restaurants, especially outside Stockholm. There’s definitely a huge pride in ”buying Swedish” though, whether it’s meat or strawberries or… anything really.
Although people shop at the chain stores (supermarkets), I love that someone has got off their backside and is giving it a go.
I do buy local, as much as is practical in my small town of 14k or so inhabitants. If you don’t use them, they’ll go out of business and that’s a terrible thing to see. Those folks have put their life and soul into their business.
We have two good butchers, a cheesemonger, a fish shop, two bakers, a florist, a greengrocer, a couple of hardware shops and even a Belgian chocolate shop. These are very local all in the town centre.
They compete with the supermarkets and are obviously successful.
I applaud them.
Wetherby, UK
There’s hardly any left in my town. The town center, once bustling with shops now almost seems like a ghost town, with lots of boarded up store fronts and “For Rent” signs. There is no incentive to buy locally anymore when most everything is available online and often at a cheaper price.
They do protect local business like local stores. But bigger chains provide better value for customers.
I dont think Norwegians are good enough at supporting small businesses. The supermarket situation is dire with the same few chains having monopoly over the market. People go there because they may be slightly cheaper but let local businesses die most of the time. Leading to the 3 big supermarket conglomerates abusing their positions and increasing prices after letting their smaller competitors die.
In terms of cafes and restaurants you also often see the chains dominating in the cities.
It is super easy to start up a business. But I don’t think many people think much about small businesses as such in their day to day.
Where you may find some “local pride” over a business it is often more if some decently successful business has roots way out in some random village or provincial town/small city. The small supermarkets and bakeries out in the countryside do tend to see local support as well, but most of those are franchises of larger chains, even if they are largely locally run
7 comments
There is a stereotype that the owners of such businesses are greedy, eager to avoid paying taxes and unpleasant to deal with. There is a word “Januszex” but I wont even try to explain it.
I find France has a very strong support of local businesses, there’s independent bakeries and butchers etc. in every neighborhood.
My native Sweden is much more American, with mostly large chains for both stores and restaurants, especially outside Stockholm. There’s definitely a huge pride in ”buying Swedish” though, whether it’s meat or strawberries or… anything really.
Although people shop at the chain stores (supermarkets), I love that someone has got off their backside and is giving it a go.
I do buy local, as much as is practical in my small town of 14k or so inhabitants. If you don’t use them, they’ll go out of business and that’s a terrible thing to see. Those folks have put their life and soul into their business.
We have two good butchers, a cheesemonger, a fish shop, two bakers, a florist, a greengrocer, a couple of hardware shops and even a Belgian chocolate shop. These are very local all in the town centre.
They compete with the supermarkets and are obviously successful.
I applaud them.
Wetherby, UK
There’s hardly any left in my town. The town center, once bustling with shops now almost seems like a ghost town, with lots of boarded up store fronts and “For Rent” signs. There is no incentive to buy locally anymore when most everything is available online and often at a cheaper price.
They do protect local business like local stores. But bigger chains provide better value for customers.
I dont think Norwegians are good enough at supporting small businesses. The supermarket situation is dire with the same few chains having monopoly over the market. People go there because they may be slightly cheaper but let local businesses die most of the time. Leading to the 3 big supermarket conglomerates abusing their positions and increasing prices after letting their smaller competitors die.
In terms of cafes and restaurants you also often see the chains dominating in the cities.
It is super easy to start up a business. But I don’t think many people think much about small businesses as such in their day to day.
Where you may find some “local pride” over a business it is often more if some decently successful business has roots way out in some random village or provincial town/small city. The small supermarkets and bakeries out in the countryside do tend to see local support as well, but most of those are franchises of larger chains, even if they are largely locally run