A St Albans lifestyle shop has been named among 100 small businesses in the UK to be celebrated by the Small Business Saturday campaign.

Herts Advertiser: Storefront of Chloe James for fashion spreadStorefront of Chloe James for fashion spread (Image: Archant)

Chloe James Lifestyle, a small shop located over two floors of a Tudor building on St Albans High Street, will now be among the select number of businesses to be featured by the ‘Small Biz 100’ campaign each day for the 100 days leading up to Small Business Saturday on December 3.

The shop, named after the children of owner Donna Nichol, opened its doors in 2010 with the aim of offering fantastic, unusual gifts, jewellery, and home and fashion products.

“I love this business,” explained Donna, “from sourcing the products to the visual merchandising to chatting with the customers and being involved in the local community.”

“There is nothing more rewarding that seeing an existing customer bring in their friends and hearing them say, ‘I love this shop! You’ve got to come in and take a look… you won’t believe it!’”

Donna continued: “We strongly believe that independent shops and restaurants create a point of difference for any town centre and we are working hard to keep our own High Street alive.”

In its fourth year, Small Business Saturday is already the UK’s most successful small business campaign – in 2015 it saw £523m spent with small businesses across the UK, an increase of £119m from the previous year.

Last year the campaign trended at number one in the UK on Twitter on the day, with more than 100,000 campaign-related tweets being sent. Over 75 per cent of local councils supported the campaign, and this year St Albans district council will be among them, alongside the Herts Ad.

Campaign director Michelle Ovens said: “The British public has a great affection for small businesses and we continue to see that grow year on year.”

“Although the campaign focuses on one day, the goal is to have a lasting impact on small businesses by changing mind-sets, so that people make it their mission to support small businesses all year round.

“Most people in this country own a small business, work for a small business or know somebody who does, so supporting a small business on Small Business Saturday is absolutely personal.”

Small Business Saturday is a grassroots, not-for-profit organisation, originally founded by American Express in the US in 2010 as part of its ongoing commitment to encourage consumers to shop small.

The campaign also benefits from the backing of leading business organisations including the Federation of Small Businesses and Enterprise Nation.