Buy Local Purchasing Ladder from Michael Shuman

In The Small-Mart Revolution by Michael Shuman, which is available for borrowing from the PWC library, he lays out a very helpful "purchasing ladder" - a hierarchy of choices that you can make about buying locally. As he puts it, "since few goods and services are perfectly local, how should you weigh various imperfections? Ultimately the answers will reflect your own tastes, values and interests."

Here's what Shuman says works for him (slightly edited for length):

1. Buy Less. In an era of increasing environmental problems and deteriorating ecological life-support systems, the overriding objective is to not waste resources. To the extent that you can grow your own food, walk instead of drive, or avoid impulse purchasing, do it. A self-reliant community ultimately must be grounded in more self-reliant individuals, families, and institutions.

2. Buy Local - The Triple Crown. If you must buy, try to find (a) a locally owned store, (b) selling locally made gods, and (c) using locally found inputs. Remember that one of the challenges for a buy-local campaign is to help identify which goods and services score highest on all three scales so that consumers don't have to do this voluminous homework by themselves.

3. Buy Local - Imperfect Choices. Finding the perfect storm of localness in everything you buy will not usually be possible. The next best approach is to find at least one element that's local. For example, I prefer to buy local produce from Giant than non-local organics from Whole Foods Market. Neither is locally owned, but at least one offers me a way to support local farmers.

4. Buy Regional. If a reasonable local option is not available, perhaps a regional one is. "Region," of course, is a vague term. It usually refers to an area defined more by ecology, geography, and culture than by legal and jurisdictional boundaries. The multiplier from buying regionally will be lower than if you had bought locally, but it will not be irrelevant.

5. Buy Bi-Local. If you cannot possibly get a local or regional source for something, try to establish a direct relationship with a more distant producer that is locally owned and import substituting in its own community.

6. Buy Fair Trade. A variation of bi-local is "fair trade," which connects purchasers of basic products like coffee, cocoa, tea, and clothing in the developed world with responsible producers in the developing world. Usually, "responsible" means removing middle-people and improving labor conditions, but local ownership is, at best, an afterthought.

7. Everything Else. 'Nuf said.

How does this hierarchy of purchasing choices work for you? What's possible in Richmond and Wayne County?