Not Amazon - Best of 2021

Not Amazon was one of my favourite discoveries of 2021. I think Ali Haberstroh started it in November 2020, so maybe it’s a best of 2020 for y’all, but I only found out about it this year.

I mean, what a cool, thoughtful, helpful idea! Placing links to all the local online shops in one place, organized by city and category? Helping local store owners get more sales in order to survive as they transition to online platforms (which many, prior to COVID, didn’t have in place)? Having a special focus on BIPOC and LQBTQ2S store owners in the featured products section? And building it all herself, volunteering her time, using low code and no code tools and a ton of internet research to find the stores? While also working a full time job? Just so incredibly resourceful and brilliant!

As someone who, before Not Amazon, has tried to find local shops online via Google, this is a huge deal. Having to go through multiple pages of hits to find each local store is a pain in the butt, particularly if you are shopping for gifts and you have no idea what you’re going to buy. This effort is a big barrier for time-strapped shoppers who may want to support local, but don’t have hours to pore over pages and pages of products or sites.

So thankful to Ali for her incredible idea and the work put in to build it!

I’m also thankful to Ali and Not Amazon for introducing me to no code tools. In a previous post we talked about no code tools like Squarespace and Wix for website development. But there are so many other no code tools that could be very useful to nonprofits and small businesses. Like Airtable. Airtable is a multi-purpose no code tool that on the surface looks like and acts like a spreadsheet (I love a grid!). But it has more powerful and flexible uses (eg, project management, grant trackers, directories, etc), excellent user interface design and tons of integrations.

To learn more about no code tools and how they can help your nonprofit or small business, book a virtual cup of tea with us.