Small business in Jamaica Plaine
I went on a tour of small businesses on Jamaica Plain on February 23.
This is a non-profit organization. The member of this group is only the director, Ginger. She is running the organization by herself. Jamaica Plain has a lot of small shops. It is difficult to run the shop for them because of cost and employees. So Ginger started to help them.
We went to many kinds of small businesses stores such as bakeries, vintage clothing, and toy store. Almost all stores use local products. One of the most memorable stores is a grocery store. In this shop, there are products made by only Massachusetts. It means every product is local. Coffee and chocolate are fair trade products. Bee is from Jamaica Plain. Also, there are chocolates from New England. This way is sustainable and good for the environment.
This organization does not only support small businesses. They built a space where people can sit down and talk in the parking space. To build it, the parking decrease. Then the amount of car decrease. Then traffic becomes less. This change will increase the number of local people who come to the shop on foot. Also, this group made a community refrigerator. If people have food that is unnecessary for some reason, they can put it into this refrigerator. And everybody can get food from it.
Finally, I often talk a walk to Jamaica Plain. So I love this area. But I didn’t know this area has such a wonderful organization. And almost all shops are doing good things for sustainability. After going on this field trip, I love this place even more. And I realized I need to care about sustainability when I go shopping.
Mei Igarashi