Today, we look back at our top posts, profiles, events and videos of the year across Alabama Retail’s website and social media accounts. We can’t wait to see what 2024 has in store!
TOP FACEBOOK POST AND CONTEST of 2023
Once again, our top social post of the year was the Alabama Retailer of the Year Customers’ Choice Award contest. The July 31-Aug. 14 Facebook photo album voting system and online poll, featuring the 57 Retailer of the Year entries, reached almost 180,000 on Facebook alone. The 2023 Customers’ Choice winner was David Christopher’s in Sheffield. The business received 976 votes, or 9% of the 10,445 votes cast, and its win reached the ninth highest number of people on the Alabama Retail Facebook page for the year.
While the Retailer of the Year entries garnered the top social response in 2023, the links to the 86 nominees also made the Top 5 on Facebook and on alabamaretail.org.
Listings of the Retailer of the Year nominees, the entrants and the winners were the most read posts on alabamaretail.org.
TOP INSTAGRAM POST OF 2023
Topping the charts for 2023 on our Shop Alabama Instagram account was the story behind Montgomery’s Storkland and The Name Dropper, two businesses under one roof on the EastChase shopping campus. Sid and Shea Schroll opened Storkland in 1977, then in 1984 bought The Name Dropper. The Schrolls’ son, Brian, and his wife, Gina, joined the family business in 2001.
Go to @ShopAlabama on Instagram to see the rest of the Top 9 for 2023.
TOP LINKEDiN POST OF 2023
With more than 2,000 unique impressions, our October visit to Dalton Pharmacy in Slocomb for its 120th anniversary reception ranked highest among our LinkedIn posts for 2023.
SALES TAX HOLIDAYS RAN AS TOP EVENTS OF 2023
With more than 24,000 people reached, the July 6 post announcing the state’s annual back-to-school sales tax holiday ranked third among Alabama Retail’s Facebook posts. And the Feb. 24 post on the first day of the severe weather preparedness tax holiday garnered the most impressions on X.
TOP FEATURED NEW MEMBER ON FACEBOOK FOR 2023
With almost 14,000 people reached and more than 15,000 impressions, Cindy’s Café in Prattville, our Featured New Member on Jan. 4 had the greatest reach of any Facebook post featuring our member businesses. Cindy Stephens started in the restaurant business in Montgomery with a Chinese restaurant, then switched to barbecue before opening the Prattville Pasta Mill and Pizzeria in 2008. In 2019, she renamed the business after herself to better reflect the food she served from down-home classics like smoked turkey, meatloaf, fried pork chops and pot roast to hoagie sandwiches and burgers.
Other member features ranking in the Facebook Top 10 included Mo’Bay Beignet Co., Planters Hardware & Building Inc., Spiller Furniture & Mattress and Bruce’s Foodland.
TOP @ALABAMARETAIL MEMBER ON X IN 2023
The opening of Jalapeños Downtown Cocina & Tequila Bar in Tuscaloosa was the top member item on our X account in 2023. The 405 23rd Ave. location features the largest selection of tequila in Alabama.
TOP ISSUES OF 2023
Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshal’s message during our annual luncheon in November drew attention to one of our top legislative issues of 2023: Retail theft and organized retail theft. Alabama’s Retail Theft Crime Prevention Act gives retailers tools to prosecute, aggregate thefts and file charges remotely. The act ranked No. 3 and 4 in terms of impressions on X. Liquor liability insurance reform was another issue making the top X posts for 2023.
FOLLOW ALABAMA RETAIL AND SHOP ALABAMA
In 2024, continue to follow Alabama Retail on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and X,