by Rick Winterson
There is a certain insanity to “Cyber Monday”, the Monday of November’s final week. Yes, we live in a cyber-influenced age, but blending this into the Winter Holiday Season is a bit extreme in our opinion. Even more insane is so-called “Black Friday”, which was originally confined to the Friday after Thanksgiving. Over the last few years, Black Friday has been stretched from well before midnight on Thanksgiving Thursday into the following weekend. In this year of 2017, Black Friday was stretched far enough backwards to include November 20 – the Monday before Thanksgiving. So we should now call it “Black Week”, maybe?
Insanity, indeed!
Fortunately, between the two volcanoes of insanity known as Black Friday and Cyber Monday, there was an oasis of sanity called “Small Business Saturday”, which was sponsored by the local Chamber and fell on November 25 this year. And which featured mild, sunny weather all day long. And which exceeded all eight previous Small Business Saturdays. Phrases such as “Indian summer” and “an early spring” were heard in the air. A walk along East and West Broadway simply window shopping at the many, many small enterprises in South Boston on Small Business Saturday was a real pleasure. This is the way to Christmas shop.
In an interview with Karen Stanley and Donna Brown after their successful South Boston Chamber B2B Night, they informed Online that the South Boston Neighborhood Development Corporation (the SBNDC) is now a Formal Sponsor of the Chamber. They mentioned some of the local businesses that are very supportive of South Boston’s Chamber activities, including East Boston Savings Bank, Dedham Savings Bank, Mass Bay Credit Union, City of Boston Credit Union, Cranberry Café, and Stapleton’s Florist, who provided the large Christmas tree in front of the Branch Library.
There are actually hundreds of small businesses open in South Boston open last Saturday. There isn’t space to show all of them, so South Boston Online pictured a few of these along Broadway. We plan to devote another article to “off-Broadway” businesses on side streets and down Dorchester Street to Andrew Square. In this article, we’ll to confine ourselves to mentioning only a few of the newest small businesses: Welcome to South Boston!
Columbus Cleaners moved into its branch quarters at 139 Emerson St., just off Broadway at Flood Square, late last summer. Billy Kamperides is the proprietor; he offers laundry, dry cleaning, and tailoring. Jessie Orbovich’s new store at 395 West Broadway held its opening gala on Tuesday evening, November 7. Her store is called “!GoGarbaj!”, and it’s a bricks-and-mortar offshoot of Jessie’s pop-up shops in places like the SoWa Open Market. Finally, an unusual shop is on the verge of opening at 365 West Broadway. It’s to be named “Micro Plant Studio”. As its name implies, it will showcase small and medium-sized plants, flowers, flower arrangements, terrariums, unique plant-related photography, and many other items (including planting workshops). Sounds fascinating.
Please let us know if you come across any new, small businesses in South Boston. And during this Season, make it a point to walk along Broadway, looking at our bustling local small business scene. It is the most attractive (and relaxing) way on the face of this Earth to do your Christmas shopping. Give it a try tonight, or over the coming weekend. But be sure to shop locally.
Thank you from South Boston’s small businesses, which includes South Boston 
