How restaurants can market each other in small towns

How can local food businesses work together to attract more diners? Here’s one practical idea. Photo M&M Cafe, Monticello, Wisconsin. Photo by Becky McCray

I loved this restaurant marketing idea from the Texas Downtown Association:

Collaborative Marketing for Local Restaurants
In order to compete with new chain restaurants, a group of Longview restaurateurs decided to band together to form a local marketing collective to help encourage people to “Chews Longview”. The marketing campaign urges people to support local businesses that give the community its unique flavor.

Now, Longview, Texas, is a small city at 80,000+ population, but I think smaller towns could adapt this idea.

You don’t have to do a fancy group website. This kind of promotion is perfect for a social media campaign. A simple hashtag is enough to start. Even one local person could start taking pictures and posting positive comments online with a message of “chews local.”

Get more collaborative marketing ideas, for service and retail businesses

In the just-released video from SaveYour.Town, Deb Brown and I share more cooperative and collaborative marketing ideas that any business can use to better reach local customers. It doesn’t take a formal organization or big funding. Anyone can put them into practice right away. Learn more about Cooperation Creates More Customers here.

• About the Author
• Latest Posts

About Becky McCray

Becky started Small Biz Survival in 2006 to share rural business and community building stories and ideas with other small town business people. She and her husband have a small cattle ranch and are lifelong entrepreneurs. Becky is an international speaker on small business and rural topics.

• How cooperatives improve small town economies - May 8, 2022
• Metaverse business idea: virtual world tour guide - April 15, 2022
• Make extra money from extra workspace: co-working and 3rd workplaces in small towns - March 28, 2022
• Trade show booth design trend: hand drawn visuals - March 21, 2022
• New business sign design? Don’t use cursive script - February 14, 2022
• Way more people prefer rural than urban, new Pew Research study finds - February 1, 2022
• Top 5 Rural and small town trends 2022 - January 3, 2022
• How to start a real small small business - December 17, 2021
• Tip for better pop-ups and shed businesses - December 5, 2021
• Small town business idea: cat grooming - November 15, 2021