I constantly buy local where practicable. Unless you are in a service business(hotel, restaurant, plumber, etc) owning a brick and mortar store has jumped the shark unless you are able to scale(Gander Mountain as an example). Anyone seen a local hardware store lately? We lost ours 3 years ago because Home Depot can buy a screw for 2 cents because they buy 30,000,000 of them. My old hardware store couldn't buy that screw for less than a quarter.
And those of you that scream "SHOP LOCAL", where do you get your gas? At the Exxon for 2.20 or the local repair shop that sells it at $2.40? That's what I thought.