Printer

Maurice Harold is the co-owner of Pitch Black Printing Company, 1108 California Ave., 476-2003, and an organizer of a “Small Business Saturday” event, set for Nov. 24, during which a coalition of small, locally owned businesses will offer special deals and raffle tickets for a chance to win gift certificates and other prizes. For more information, visit pitchblackprintingco.com.

Tell me about Small Business Saturday.

We came up with the idea because we wanted to find a way to get not just people involved, but other shops involved. Because we’re kind of off the beaten path a little bit, and we have other people that we know—like The Nest is tucked into a weird little area and everyone out on Dickerson [Road]. I feel like a lot of people think about midtown when they think about Reno, but there’s a lot more going on. So, we just wanted to think of a way to get people to at least notice all the other little businesses around town … that are going to be participating. The original idea was to do, like, a bingo card where you’d have to go to all the businesses, but the more we thought about it, the more we realized that a lot of the businesses that we’re asking to participate are really spread out, and that would be kind of a chore. … People would just give up half way through. So, we came up with the idea of doing a drawing. So, if you go to each one of the vendors that are involved, they’ll give you an entry into a drawing for a basket, and we figured that way everybody would have a chance to win something.

Who's participating?

Juice Box Yoga … free classes all day. BGT Gallery is having snacks. … The Nest is doing it. Northern Nevada Healing Arts is doing in-chair massages. The Wyld Market down in the Basement—they’re participating. They’re going to have a bunch of artists and vendors selling stuff down there in the Basement. We also have NØRDIK, a store in the Basement, and they’ll be doing Norwegian snacks and sales on items. Bad Apple Vntg.—that’s the thing—it’s so spread out. We even have a place on the south end of town, Colour by Bloom is having a sale on art supplies and things. … [Pitch Black co-owner] Megan [O’Reilly] just reached out to a bunch of them all at once, one big email blast. And a bunch of people responded and brought in other vendors. … Kind of a word-of-mouth thing.

What do all these businesses have in common?

They’re all locally owned-and-run businesses. They’re not all retail stores. … They’re all locally-owned, and all great businesses.

They’re also on the small side, because something like Eldorado is also a locally owned business.

That’s true. Most of them just have one location—except Dorinda’s Chocolates and Juice Box Yoga, and they just have two [locations]. Most of them just have the one tiny spot.

And is this a reaction against Black Friday and Cyber Monday?

I don’t know. We’re not really trying to—I mean, I can’t stand Black Friday. I’ve worked too much retail to ever want to be involved in Black Friday. Other than the fact that they’re making people work, like, 24 hours a day. Fortunately, I got out of clothing retail before the-opening-at midnight-and-staying-open-til-the-next-midnight really took effect. I was out of there. It’s just insane. Plus, the deals just aren't that good. They're not worth trampling somebody at Walmart.