Shire continues to support local business community through pandemic

In a continued response to the COVID-19 crisis, the next suite of initiatives to be funded under the Shire of Augusta Margaret River’s two million dollar Community Care Package have just been announced.

Margaret River Chamber of Commerce & Industry will receive staged funding to enable them to offer free membership to local businesses within the Shire along with a range of other initiatives designed to support local businesses over the next three months.

Shire of Augusta Margaret River Chief Executive Officer, Stephanie Addison-Brown said the package will deliver a host of great initiatives for local businesses.

“A range of support options from reimbursement for accountancy consultation through to technical support for websites will be provided for those in need”, Ms Addison-Brown said.

In addition to this, a total of $41,850 has been allocated to the Lishman Health Foundation in partnership with Mindful Margaret River to provide a free business mentoring and guidance service. This service has been designed to help local businesses with business planning/remodelling in response to any impact they have felt from the pandemic and to enable access to support services.

The Shire’s Community Care Package funding is open to businesses, community organisations and groups who have good ideas to support the wider community during the pandemic.

In addition to this, the Shire has recently partnered with the MRCCI and Transition Margaret River to develop a campaign to highlight the many benefits that supporting our local economy bring to the community. 

The LOCAL-IS-More campaign has already featured half-page advertisements in the AMR Times over the past two weeks and the Shire funded an 8 page spread on local businesses’ amended offerings in light of COVID-19.

Shire of Augusta Margaret River Sustainable Economy Officer, Saul Cresswell, said it is expected that this campaign will become increasingly important in the recovery stage of this pandemic.

“Every dollar spent at a local business has a much higher rate of remaining in the community, supporting local production and local jobs”, Mr Cresswell said.

“The campaign branding has been finalised by local graphic design company Ground Creative and is looking really great.”

Construction on the LOCAL-IS-More website is well underway and will be made public soon.

Local businesses requiring specific assistance on government allowances and benefits can also seek free advice from the Small Business Development Corporation.