Courtesy of Saratoga County Chamber
The Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce’s award-winning Love Our Locals Campaign had another record-breaking year in 2024, with more than $315,243 spent supporting the local economy.
As part of the end-of-year program, shoppers and donors were encouraged to submit their receipts of $20.24 or more spent at a Saratoga County business or donated to a local nonprofit to be entered in a gift card giveaway.
Nearly 3,500 receipts were submitted over the eight-week campaign, and dozens of lucky participants were rewarded for supporting local as gift card winners.
In the initiative’s past four-years, more than 10,000 receipts have been submitted totaling $843,616.
Love Our Locals $20.24 was generously sponsored by SaratogaWine.com and more than 50 area businesses that donated gift cards.
This campaign started as Save Our Locals $20.21, which resulted in more than 2,000 entries from locals whose purchases directly aided in the county’s economic rebound from COVID-19 restrictions.
In 2022, the Save Our Locals program was recognized with a New York State Tourism Excellence Award from the New York State Tourism Industry Association.
The campaign was renamed Love Our Locals in 2022, and it remains a popular and purposeful initiative for the Chamber, the business community and the impact sector in Saratoga County.
The $315,243 total reached in 2024 is more than $100,000 more than the previous year’s Love Our Locals total of $206,384. About 1,000 more receipts were submitted to help reach this goal.
“The Chamber would like to thank everyone who supported Love Our Locals $20.24 by choosing to spend with local businesses and nonprofits. Our hope is that you will continue to love our locals all throughout 2025,” said Todd Shimkus, president of the Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce. “We are extremely grateful to our sponsors and gift card donors who helped make this program a success in 2024, and we look forward to bringing back Love Our Locals $20.25 later this year.”