TAMPA, Fla. — Nationwide, 2024 was a challenging year for small businesses.
“You know there’s things that happen both locally and nationally that impact our businesses every day,” said Kelly Flannery, President & CEO of South Tampa Chamber of Commerce
Many shops have been dealing with labor shortages, supply chain issues, and the impacts of inflation. In addition, here in Tampa Bay, our local shops had to recover from two back-to-back hurricanes.
“It was a tough year last year, especially in Tampa here for us with the hurricanes and everything,” said Allison Bernardi, owner of Hazel + Dot.
When I visited Bernardi’s store in January, she told me that shops were still recovering.
“All of us combined are putting our resources back into this community,” said Bernardi.
After an unbelievably tough year though, people in the small business community have a positive outlook for 2025.
“I do think that there’s hope for small businesses,” said Flannery.
Shops like For the Bay Clothing Co. have seen tremendous growth.
“People around the community have been so welcoming. And people are for the bay,” said Dave Gesacion, owner of For the Bay Clothing Co.
He built his business on the idea of supporting Tampa Bay.
“It’s just having pride, having pride for our community and if we can increase that pride through somebody wearing a t-shirt or wearing a hat, that’s pretty special,” said Gesacion.
For the Bay Clothing is a store that sells clothing and accessories that represent Tampa Bay, including our sports teams and schools. Gesacion began For the Bay Clothing when the world shut down in 2020 and hasn’t stopped working, starting at local markets all across the area.
Now he’s in a shop on Henderson Boulevard in Tampa and his business is growing.
“Just walking around and seeing people wearing stuff, it never gets old,” said Gesacion.
Although 2024 was a difficult year for many local shops, he hopes community support will ramp up even more in 2025.
“It’s amazing. You know we’re a small business, my wife and I have 6 children combined, a blended family. 3 of them are triplets that are graduating this year. So it’s important to see that it’s genuine. It’s real. It’s authentic. We’re real people, we’re real fans. We’re just people in the community like everyone else just trying to make it. And showing our kids how important it is to work hard and believe in something and if you work hard enough and partner with the right people and have a great inner circle, you can do anything,” said Gesacion.
Bernardi also stressed the importance of community support.
“I know it’s easy to order online and get it delivered, you know the next morning, but that money is not going back into your community. So shopping local is really so helpful to everyone in our community,” said Bernardi.
“Our small business owners are our friends, our family, our neighbors. And we always see our community come to bat for businesses and help support them where they can,” said Flannery.
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