Stuart’s first-ever community-wide “Small Business Saturday” event was “very successful” according to event organizer Lynsi Pasutti, and she continues to receive great feedback from some of the local business owners who participated.

Pasutti says it was also encouraging to see many new faces during Saturday’s shop local campaign, and overall, Small Business Saturday exceeded her expectations.

“I am just so please that it really came to fruition and it was successful.  There is already this momentum to do it again next year, and ‘what can be do before next year?’, you know another miniature event and things like that.  So I think it was a very positive experience overall and there is always room for improvement or growth, and I just think you’re going to see a lot from us in the Stuart area as we keep on promoting small businesses and what we’ve got going on in town.”

One of the ways Pasutti helped to drive traffic to the city-wide shopping event was by offering what ended up being a total of about $1,200 in grand prizes–be they gift certificates, Chamber bucks or donated items–to local residents who participated in the local shopping Saturday.

That prize money will be divided amongst three winners, with the lucky recipients being area residents Irene Varnes, Regina James and Hope Wilhelm.

Prize winner or not, Pasutti hopes any area residents who showed up in Stuart on Saturday had a great time, and she looks forward to making the event bigger and better in the years ahead.