If someone is shopping on Saturday, Park City leaders want them to spend money at small businesses.

The Park City Council at a recent meeting approved a resolution that proclaims Saturday as Small Business Saturday in the community. The elected officials did not discuss the resolution, but they typically approve a similar one each year at about the same time.

The resolution is designed to encourage people to support small businesses as the holiday shopping season begins in earnest later this week. It is also meant to highlight the importance of small businesses to the community. Small Business Saturday follows the day after the traditionally busy Black Friday.

American Express launched Small Business Saturday in 2010, as the nation was amid the financial crisis of that era. The company says consumers have spent upward of a combined $140 billion on the Small Business Saturdays.

Park City offers an eclectic lineup of small businesses across the commercial areas. The Main Street core has an especially well-known concentration of shops, boutiques and galleries that draw a mix of Parkites and visitors. Other business districts in the city also attract customers from Park City and some outsiders.

The resolution approved by the City Council notes that small businesses account for 99.7% of businesses that have employees in the U.S. They employ 47.1% of the private-sector workers in the country, the resolution adds.

“The government of Park City, Utah, celebrates our local small businesses and the contributions they make to our local economy and community,” the resolution says.

It adds that the elected officials “urge the residents of our community, and communities across the country, to support small businesses and merchants on Small Business Saturday and throughout the year.”

A City Hall report drafted in anticipation of the recent meeting, meanwhile, says “small businesses are the lifeblood of our city, and we salute small business owners, entrepreneurs, and employees for enhancing our community and expanding opportunities for all the residents of Park City and the surrounding communities.”

“The hard work and ingenuity of our small business owners are helping to sustain our economic strength, vitality and authenticity,” the report adds.

The holiday shopping season is not seen as crucial to Park City businesses as it is elsewhere. The core stretch of the ski season from the middle of December to mid-March is an especially lucrative period for many Park City businesses. Holiday shopping can provide a strong start to the ski season for businesses, though, as it bridges the fall shoulder season and the winter.

The Park City economy has outperformed expectations since the early months of the novel coronavirus pandemic. Sales-tax numbers, which are an important economic indicator since they are charged on such a broad range of transactions, have beaten projections consistently, as an example.