To promote local buying, this week the Charlevoix Chamber of Commerce launched the chouenne, a local currency that is spent on businesses in the region.
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Cabbage is currently accepted in more than a hundred places and is already promising.
“Cabbage equals a dollar. It’s easy, there is no exchange rate and there is no speculation either. You can buy paper cabbage or you can buy digital cabbage.”
The project seeks to counteract the exodus of customers to large centers such as Quebec and online shopping.
“What we wanted was to be able to hold local money for the sake of economic prosperity and to continue to support local businesses,” said Ms. Côté.
Customers can order cabbage from the Chamber of Commerce and this currency can also be downloaded to their mobile devices. In the long run, we hope to be able to deploy counters in the area.
“It’s a bit like a prepaid card. […] Ms. Côté pointed out that it is the method of payment that is changing.
To encourage residents to use cabbage, the Chamber of Commerce is offering an introductory promotion that increases the value of cabbage purchased by 20% to a maximum of 250,000 cabbages traded.
After that, everyone who goes to buy cabbage will still have a 5% discount every time they buy cabbage. “It increases the purchasing power of the people of our region,” said Johann Côté.
As of Saturday, there were still about 70,000 coins available, a sign that the new coin craze is very much there.
The merchants were also excited about this project.
“It’s a bad word that we use a lot, but really buying local is buying from someone who will come back to buy from you and you will come back to buy from them,” Jolie said. – The owner of the dent. So the circular economy associated with this is an advantage. When I saw who was participating, and there will still be many more to be added, I already know where to spend all my cabbage.”
The goal is for cabbage to become timeless and for locals to continue using it for years to come.