Two people came up with a simple solution to help Michigan’s local businesses that are hurting due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The solution is a website called Save MI Faves and its sole purpose is to help people buy gift cards to their favorite local businesses.
Josh Botkin, a co-founder of Save MI Faves, says the goal was to get as much money into the hands of small business owners as possible.
“Gift cards seemed like a really quick and easy way for people to transfer that money,” Botkin said.
Botkin says his website makes no money from doing this, it simply connects people with a way to support local businesses – aside from buying the products those businesses sell.
While the site started with just Ann Arbor businesses, Botkin says it quickly expanded.
“Now we’re partnering with people in communities across the state, different downtown development associations and so forth so that they can help us get the folks in their community listed quickly as possible,” he said.
Having started with just local restaurants, Save MI Faves is now partnered up with more than 200 businesses across the state including Buddy’s Pizza, The M Den, and Wheelhouse Detroit.
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