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I buy vegetables from the local farm stand whenever I can. I have one around the corner from my house and they’re just recently starting to get a good amount of stuff. Signed up to be a CSA member this year too.

I buy something from Amazon everyday to accelerate climate change and the deterioration of capitalism. So that my socialist utopia can emerge where we all have small businesses. /s

Difficult. Every time I thought “don’t support Amazon this time, buy from this small webshop” I was disappointed.

The problem is that smaller shops often really suck with customer care. When buying from smaller businesses, I now always want some “big business” (Amazon or eBay) in between. Way easier to get support this way.

I tip higher at small restaurants than at chains

If at all possible I pay in cash to small businesses. No cc fees for them. Big stores …screw them. I want my points.

I don’t use my platinum, obsidian super primo credit card at small businesses. I use debit or cash

I’ve effectively stopped shopping on Amazon. Almost everything is available by another, smaller website that has way faster shipping since Prime Shipping is a complete farce now.

Even the weird niche stuff can be found somewhere like Walmart. AliExpress, too. Which, at the rate Amazon is going, will soon have faster ship times too.

I mostly eat at local restaurants.

A lot of times it helps to have niche hobbies. Amazon (or similar) isn’t the best bet to buy things for many of my hobbies.

There’s a corner store around the corner from me where I buy like 99% of my groceries. It’s a local business and it’s less than 60 seconds walking distance from me. Plus it doesn’t price gouge me the way the chain grocery stores do

I try to snop at snaller businesses whenn I can

I don’t really go out of my way. It’s more like an ingrained habit.

Most notably, I’ve never bought a single thing from Amazon. I don’t even have an account with them. That’s not an ethical decision though - it sort of works out that way, but really it’s just a gut-level reaction. The whole idea just repulses me - just looking at a page from their site is somehow gross and creepy.

By the same token, there’s a long list of businesses I’ve either never gone to or at least haven’t in the last twenty or so years - Walmart, McDonalds, Starbucks, Taco Bell, Olive Garden, Kroger, Subway, Jack in the Box, etc., etc. Basically, if they’re big enough to run national level advertising, they are eliminated from my consideration. And again, it’s not really a conscious choice - they just gross me out. It’s like the instant I set foot in a place like that, I can feel it corroding my soul.

So when I’m looking for somewhere to shop or eat or whatever, just like anyone else does, there are specific places I don’t consider at all. And all major corporations are on that list.

So what’s left over - what I choose from - is local or regional, not because I go out of my way to choose them, but just because they’re the only ones I’m willing to choose in the first place

And the sort of surprising thing, even to me sometimes, is that I’m by no means starved for choices. There’s a world of alternatives out there.

I prefer vegetables from the local farmer when they have them in stock at the grocery store.

I buy electronics from the not small business but the big chain that actually has a physical store in town.

I never buy weed from Amazon