ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — A new program is a dream turned reality for small businesses in St. Pete.
"They're discovering this whole new world of new clients, new people who never even knew they existed," Stan Arthur said.
Arthur is the creator of the key tag rewards program. He started the "I Love St. Pete" Facebook page 10 years ago and is using it to help people in his own community.
"I literally woke up from a dream six weeks ago in the morning with this whole key tag thing in my head. A rewards program for members of the group and the very next day, I ordered my first 1,000 key tags," Arthur said. "Before I knew it, they had all been distributed to all these local businesses that wanted to get involved and it just blew up overnight."
The key tags are now the talk of the town. Customers get a discount whenever they show them at a business that's participating in St. Pete.
"It was such an exciting opportunity and a community service so that everybody was able to shop local, which is a big reason why we still exist," Nicole Mount said.
Mount is the district manager of Stellie Bellies. She knows it isn't easy to stay afloat if customers don't know you exist, adding, she says business has gone up since they joined the program.
"I believe we started out with about 50 and now we’re down to three, so we’re going to have to give him a call-up and make sure we get some more!" Mount said. "A lot of people that didn’t know about us found out about us through these tags."
Thousands of tags are making people shop local. More than 100 businesses are participating and say sales have gone up 20-30 percent in the last month.
"To be able to help out local businesses who are struggling and just trying to get themselves on the map and make sure people know they even exist, that's a beautiful thing," Arthur said.
You can find a list of all the participating businesses on the "I Love St. Pete" Facebook page. Arthur says the discount at each business varies and is up to the owner.
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