Member Article

Lancaster agency launches online gift voucher shop to support local small businesses during second lockdown

Lancaster creative agency Hotfoot Design has launched a new online gift voucher shop aimed at encouraging residents in its hometown to buy Christmas presents from independent local businesses during the second lockdown.

Giftlancaster.org.uk offers people a simple way to shop locally online by bringing together gifts and experiences from a variety of small businesses and retailers across Lancaster and Morecambe Bay. Gift vouchers are purchased directly from the chosen business in a few simple clicks and delivered instantly by email, ready to be gifted to loved ones this Christmas.

Gift Lancaster hosts vouchers from local independent businesses - including Lancaster Brewery, Arteria shop and gallery, DF Studio, Lancaster Escape, Journey Social, Wobbly Cobbler, Expressions, The Canal Turn, Sue Shields Spa, Ashton Hall Garden Centre, Provino wines and the Sun Hotel and Bar - for a wide selection of gifts, such as restaurant meals for two, home interior gifts and beauty treatments, to escape rooms and at-home wine tasting experiences and brewery tours.

Guy Cookson, director at Hotfoot Design, said: “With this second lockdown coming at a critical time for Christmas spending and taking away the opportunity for people to spend locally in-person, our much-loved independent businesses and retailers need our support more than ever. Choosing to spend more of our money locally helps to secure local jobs, keeps investment in the local economy and community, and helps to support the independent high street and unique variety of businesses we have here in Lancaster and across Morecambe Bay.”

Cookson continues: “Our Gift Lancaster initiative gives local people a quick and easy way to do their Christmas shop with small businesses, while giving their loved ones a local gift or experience they’ll really look forward to.”

Phil Simpson, director of C2 investments, which owns Lancaster Brewery and hospitality venues across the North West, said, “This year has been incredibly challenging for not only us in the hospitality industry, but for many people and businesses across the community, and this second lockdown exacerbates that once more. Gift Lancaster taps into the growing trend towards online shopping and the fact that people do want to shop and buy locally more than ever, so with online being the only sales route for many businesses right now, I really do hope that our local community gets behind it ahead of Christmas.”

Jane Richardson, owner of Arteria gift shop and gallery, said: “2020 has been a tough year for retail and the high street, we’ve had to continually adapt the business to accommodate our customers’ needs during these challenging times. Great things can happen if we all come together and with initiatives like Gift Lancaster and the support of local residents choosing local small businesses this Christmas, we will get through this.”

Lancaster and Morecambe Bay small businesses are invited to sign up to Gift Lancaster to sell their gift vouchers ahead of the Christmas season.

Hotfoot Design also runs Lancashire and Cumbria-wide gift voucher site Vouch, which offers a selection of gifts and experiences from independent businesses across the counties, and supported small businesses at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic with free online gift voucher shops.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Stacey Waugh .