How Does The Holiday Halo Affect Impact Small Businesses

Main Street represents what Americans appreciate about the holidays.

The media commonly portrays small businesses as keystone locations for celebrating the holidays and for good reason. According to a recent Main Street America podcast, “There are more than 33 million small businesses, of which 90 percent have less than 20 employees. These businesses serve as the key drivers of our nations’ economy: 63% said they hire locally and more than 50% said they use local vendors themselves for their business.” Whether you want to call them mom and pop shops or local independents, these are very small businesses providing a local touch to our shopping, eating and daily experiences.

And when Americans think about a Main Street district, they tend to think of retail gift shops and food and beverage businesses, and according to Main Street America. Those are the two dominant types: a little more than 60% are either retail business or a food and beverage business. But there are also a swath of professional services from banks, lawyers and tax preparers to personal care enterprises like barbers, salons, and spas who are part of the network and personal connections community members seek. And, small businesses they are also “stealth contributors” to the local economy. According to Main Street America, over 70% of small business owners contribute to local causes such as school fundraisers, local music and art festivals, Little League teams….or perhaps this time of year, hosting and funding community holiday displays and celebrations.

The Hallmark Effect

It is no surprise that small business owners play starring roles in the “must-see” line-up of holiday movies: from the underlying populist theme of It’s a Wonderful Life to Luke’s coffee shop serving as the backdrop for a Gilmore Girls holiday episode to numerous Hallmark movies starring hometown heroes who both champion their Main Street while winning the hearts of their co-star. Kit Hughes, an associate professor of film and media studies at Colorado State University, leveraged her own obsession with holiday films to explore the changing dynamics of small town America. Hallmark’s beloved brand of cheesy, cheery holiday rom-com is ubiquitous during the holidays, but Hughes notes that fewer may pay attention to another underlying trend: one of the romantic leads is commonly a small business owner that is heroic in the eyes of their partner, but also the whole community.

Why Is The Small Business Owner Such A Powerful Example Of Good?

In a deeper look at Pew Research Center’s 2024 survey that looked at what institutions Americans trust the most, over 85% of respondents were positive about the role of small business owners, in contrast to the large corporations that ranked lowest in the survey.

Small businesses benefit from a perception of connectedness and geographic scale. They are seen as family-owned entities, embedded in local communities, contributing to school fundraisers and with floats in the main street parade. Even if overly forgiving and optimistic, the Small Business owner archetype is commonly aligned with the quest for the American dream driven by their work ethic, but also due to their willingness to serve as a community “third place”.

Third places are a term coined by Ray Oldenburg in the 1990s, and represents familiar public spots such as brewpubs, recreation centers, coffee shops, religious institutions or farmers markets where community members connect over a shared interest or activity. The Good Trade characterizes third places as “A ‘place on the corner,’ real life alternatives to television, easy escapes the routines of work and family life.” These third places offer up a haven for us to escape to when we’re stressed or to engage when we seek connections outside our household. So, seeing small business third places as the main setting for holiday movies makes sense.

“It’s a fantasy that includes independence and freedom for the small business owner,” Hughes said about the Hallmark halo effect on small businesses for her CSU podcast, The Audit. “….and the small business owner is just one in a cast of characters used in popular narratives to shape how Americans think about the economy,” Hughes said. She goes on to note these storylines can also influence how society views citizenship, the economic “heroes and villians” and how Americans perceive the balance of power in markets and the economy.