SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Santa came early for seven-month-old Reid Aubry, but his dad almost missed it.

This year, 1,616 completed passports were returned for a chance to win a $3,000 shopping spree. Participants collected stamps for every $20 spent at a participating local business. - photo courtesy of the Yellowknife Chamber of Commerce

Michael Aubry won a $3,000 shopping spree last week, making him the big winner of this year's #shopyk Passport Program.

"I was actually in a meeting at work, and I got a couple of phone calls, first from Deneen (Everett), the chamber of commerce director, and from my girlfriend. I was wondering what the heck was going on, I called them back and then they were all freaking out," said Michael Aubry. "I was obviously ecstatic about it."

He says his family plans to use the money on supplies for Reid, including a new stroller, as well as donating gift cards to local charities.

"We've been brainstorming last night about where we could put the money," said Aubry. "We have a shopping list of things we're looking at getting. I think it's great to be able to buy all that stuff locally as well. That's a huge thing for us."

In its second year, the local shopping initiative allows people to collect a stamp for every $20 spent at a participating local business. Each filled passport of 30 stamps is entered in a draw for the chance to win a $3,000 gift certificate, to be spent at participating local businesses.

This year, the number of businesses taking part increased to 54, 11 more than last year.

"These are the businesses that sponsor our community events and our kids' sports teams, they're the ones that pay taxes and employ our workers here in Yellowknife, so it's important to support them so that they can continue their presence in Yellowknife," said Deneen Everett, executive director of the Yellowknife Chamber of Commerce. The chamber and the City of Yellowknife partnered together on the program.

In total, 1,616 passports were completed and returned, 198 more than last year, for a total of $969,600 spent locally.

"We're confident that it is much more than that when you take into consideration half filled passports or people who didn't actually return their passport for whatever reason," added Everett.

Money spent locally has an even bigger impact than its dollar value, according to Richard McIntosh, communications and economic development officer for the City of Yellowknife.

"Money that gets spent locally has value added to it. It's actually worth up to three times the amount of that dollar," he said, explaining the city uses a calculation from shoplocally.com to determine what each local dollar means. He estimates that for every $1 spent at a local business, $1.45 is invested locally.

Aubry told Yellowknifer this is why he participated in the contest.

"I think it's a huge boon to the community. To be able to support local businesses is why we started doing it in the first place," said Aubrey. "It's so important to support those small businesses that are here for excellent reasons, and to avoid shopping online if you can. There's usually the same product here, it might be a little more expensive buying local, but I think it pays off in the long run to be able to keep these businesses in town."

He said most of their stamps came from places like Overlander Sports, Sutherland's Drugs and Quality Furniture.

"I bought some gifts that are still a secret, so don't reveal them!" said Aubrey. "Throughout the holiday season we try to do all our shopping locally if we can."

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