Americans will spend more than $650 billion on gifts, entertaining and food for the holidays.

Buy Local Month, sponsored by Local First Arizona, runs from Black Friday, Nov. 25, through Sunday, Jan. 1.

Check your list twice and think critically about where you might spend your money. While some rare items on your list might only be found through specialty stores halfway across the country, many of the items can likely be purchased from local stores in Sedona or the Verde Valley, or at least in nearby communities of Northern Arizona.

Consider instead purchasing these items from locally-owned stores rather than just clicking the “buy” button on a website and sending your money out of our community and our state, especially if the price is the same.

Only 13 cents of every dollar spent at a nationally-owned chain stays in the local community, with most of the profit going to other communities.

Four times more money stays in the local economy when dollars are spent with a local businesses rather than a national chain or global online retailer, according to Kimber Lanning, founder and director of Local First Arizona.

“By keeping our dollars in Arizona, we take control of our state’s economic future through supporting our fellow neighbors in creating entrepreneurial opportunities and jobs in our local communities,” Lanning said.

The money you spend at a local store isn’t just the required state and local tax revenue, but money for employees’ salaries, electric bills, building rents, local vendors who create, deliver and supply products, local advertising and annual profits that down the road leads to store expansion, new building construction, more products, more employees.

Those employees who live and work here return that money back to the local economy when they go out to eat, buy school clothes for their kids or pay their rents or mortgages.

When deciding what to buy for the holidays, look through our publications. We print two stand-alone Gift Guide tabs in these final weeks before Christmas and Hanukkah and two special sections inside our regular newspapers.

Each of these is packed with specials, deals and offers by locally owned businesses tailored specifically for the holidays. Our Gift Guides also have decorating, entertaining, shopping and safety tips as well as interesting new recipes you may want to try out this year.

We hope you will take the time to see what local vendors have to offer and support them this season. They and their employees will thank you for the purchase and keep your money in our economy to circulate and benefit even more of your neighbors.