If you love to prepare meals that are healthy and taste spectacular, you might not be too pleased with the selection of food available at your local chain grocery store. Many of the foods you find on the shelves of your local grocer are full of preservatives and other additives, and even the produce aisle often yields fruits and vegetables with muted, almost watered-down flavor. But you don’t have to shop at the grocery store. Here are seven reasons why you should do your shopping with local farmers and artisans.
1. More Flavor
If you place great importance on the taste of the food you eat, buying locally is the way to go. When you buy your food from local farmers and artisans, your food will taste better. This is especially true when it comes to fruit and vegetables.
2. Helps Small Businesses
In today’s world, it is harder and harder for a mom and pop type shop to succeed. If this bothers you, you can feel guilt free when you buy locally. Instead of giving your hard earned money to a soulless grocery chain, you are helping a small business owner thrive when you buy your food locally (Our Community Loves Local Food!).
3. Helps Your Community
When you buy locally, you are helping to contribute to your local economy while supporting the little local shops that add uniqueness to your community. From providing jobs to the people in your town to simply making your community more interesting, buying locally means you take pride in where you live.
4. Good for the Environment
If you are concerned about the environment, buying local can enable you to help the earth in your own little way. When food is shipped to big chain grocery stores, this can create a strain on the environment in numerous ways. When you buy local, you are lessening your carbon footprint and helping our planet (Food’s Carbon Footprint).
5. Healthier Food
Farm fresh food is more nutritious than the heavily processed, mass produced foods found on the shelves of your local chain grocery store. If you are careful about what you put in your body, shopping from local farmers and artisans is a good way to lead a healthier life (52 Tips for Eating Healthy).
6. Unique Food Options
Chances are, your local farmer or artisan has a variety of unique food options and recipes that can give you a truly unique dining experience. From baked apple pie to uniquely flavored sauces, you can get unique food when you buy locally.
7. Super Fresh Food
When you buy locally grown foods, you can be confident knowing you are getting the freshest food possible. If you value fresh food, then you need to buy food that was grown locally and may have been picked off the vine or baked just this morning.
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When you choose to buy your food locally from farmers and artisans, you can be certain you will get great tasting, fresh, unique food options while supporting a local small business and helping your community. You will also be doing your part to help the environment. If you consider yourself a person who prefers the highest quality, healthiest food, you should consider buying your food locally.