With all of the convenience available to us at the touch of a mouse, to order anything we need from a faceless website warehouse or online auction full of importers and resellers, what’s the benefit to shopping local?

Turns out, it’s an important way to build and keep a strong, successful community around you.

Local business means local jobs, and more money stays in the community. A small business will often patronize other local businesses as part of operations. Their network of vendors, bankers and suppliers helps strengthen the local economy.

You’ll notice that businesses owned and run by members of the community tend to be keen to support neighborhood nonprofits and community investments. This responsiveness and accountability is often notably absent from national corporate chains or conglomerates.

As a bonus, buying local also tends to be easier on the environment, with freight and shipping giving many products from big box stores or online retailers a significant carbon footprint.

Aside from shopping and buying gift cards at your local restaurants, grocery stores, salons and shops, what else can we do to support all of this?

HealthChoice of Michigan aims to support our local small businesses by offering affordable, quality health coverage to entrepreneurs, business-owners and their teams.

Our programs were developed with the goals of stabilizing healthcare costs for businesses throughout Wayne and Oakland County -- and reducing the number of uninsured.

By offering HealthChoice to your team, you can improve job satisfaction and recruiting. Employees think twice before leaving a job with health coverage, reducing employee turnover and letting your employees be more productive.

Those healthier families and employees are then a stronger part of the local community fabric, so health coverage is good for economic health, too!