Did you know that shopping local ensures that 68 cents on every dollar remains in the local economy? Money you spend locally gets circulated right back into your community. You’re helping locals keep their jobs, create more jobs, and invest in local community initiatives.

Shopping local means keeping money local, building a better local economy, reducing environmental impact, creating jobs, connecting with the community, putting your taxes to good use, supporting local creators, getting better customer service, helping local nonprofits, getting fresher and more unique products, putting a face to the creator, keeping the community unique, and encouraging local prosperity. Whew! That’s a lot of good!

There are so many wonderful small businesses in Cincinnati so, whenever you are able, skip the big box stores and shop small instead—especially for gift giving during the holidays and for birthdays, anniversaries, retirements, housewarmings, and many more occasions.

If you are you looking for any specific or custom recommendations, just ask!

Gifts and Retail

Can’t decide what you want to give, but want to provide a number of local options? Check out the Queen City Card, which features dozens of participating restaurants, drinkeries, shops, markets, hotels, experiences, museums, and more. Click here to buy yours and to see a complete list of participating merchants.

Music

Have a music lover or phonophile in your life? Head to one of many record shops in the area. Just some recommendations include:

Everybody’s Records Northside
Records, tapes, and CDs

Plaid Room Records Loveland
New and used record store

Shake It Records Pleasant Ridge
Records, DVDs, books, and music (and related) culture magazines and fanzines

Home Decor

High Street Mt. Auburn
Homeware, gifts, and furniture. Rosemary’s, featuring coffee, cocktails, wine, and light bites, is now open on the second floor during business hours.

Montclair Street Westwood
Home decor, wine, and florals

Sara’s House Hamilton
Home Decor, women’s clothing, and gift shop

Wildfire Hygge Goods Hamilton
Everyday and seasonal home decor, gifts, and apparel

Plants & Florals

Fern College Hill
Plants, planters, tools, home decor, and classes

Frond Westwood
Houseplants, hand-crafted pots, and other accessories, plus a small selection of gifts

Gia and the Blooms Findlay Market, OTR
Plants, flowers, gifts, weddings

Sadie Blossoms
Flower and plant subscriptions

Apparel

Cincy Shirts cincyshirts.com
Cincinnati- and pop culture-themed apparel and accessories

Corporate Hyde Park
Sneaker and clothing shop

Handzy Shop + Studio Covington
Clothing and accessories for women and body + toddler

Koch Sporting Goods Central Business District
Cincinnati’s oldest and largest sporting goods store, including sports apparel, team equipment, and more

Originalitees originalitees.com
Clothing line that specializes in state, city, and neighborhood pride apparel. Catch them at an area market.

Pop Cultur’d Co OTR
Apparel and accessories, home decor, stationery, and more. They also host ongoing events and workshops.

Rivertown Inkery Oakley, OTR
Boutique clothing and design brand featuring classic, timeless design and Cincinnati-inspired designs

Vintage and Secondhand

Flamingo Haven Antique Mall Spring Grove Village
Antique and vintage market with over 60 curated booths and showcases. Open seven days a week.

Ohio Valley Antique Mall Fairfield
Cincinnati’s largest multi-dealer antique mall featuring over 550 dealers purveying antiques, collectibles, books, furniture, vintage clothing, and accessories. Open seven days a week.

Tasty Bird Vintage Walnut Hills
Indoor vintage and antique market featuring 30+ local vendors under one roof; a curated selection of housewares, furniture and clothes from the ’30s through the ’90s.

Zeitgeist Supply Westwood
Women’s and men’s apparel, accessories, handbags and wallets, and Told Ya Sew

Gifts

Artichoke OTR
Cookware, knives, and kitchen essentials. Artichoke also hosts classes. Click here for more.

Handzy Shop + Studio Covington
Stationery, accessories, desk supplies, greeting cards, and so much more

Lucca Findlay Market, Newtown
Home goods, stationery, kitchenware, and dried florals

Manitou Candle Co. Columbia Tusculum
Candles made from soy wax and essential oils that an are hand poured in small batches. Workshops are also available.

MiCA 12/v OTR
Art, fine craft, and design-based gift shop

SKT Ceramics Findlay Market, Walnut Hills
Hand-crafted porcelain tableware and hand printed textiles and goods

The Sticker Shop Wyoming
Stickers, stationery, and more. Click here to view their workshop calendar.

Books

The Bookery Columbia Tusculum

Downbound Books Northside
Books, games, and stationery

Joseph Beth Booksellers Norwood
Independent bookstore that also has an Ohio section full of locals reads and goods, as well as a large kids’ shop with games, toys, and books

Local book ideas:
SENATE: Street & Savory, a cookbook by local chef, Daniel Wright
The Cincinnati Anthology, edited by Zan McQuade
Walking Cincinnati, a guide to urban hikes in many of Cincinnati’s historic neighborhoods

For any Queen City lovers in your life, a subscription to Cincinnati Magazine is an excellent option.

Did you know? You can support a local bookstore with a Libro.fm subscription, where your audiobook subscription supports the local bookstore of your choice.

Sustainable and Beauty Care

Continual Goods continualgoods.com
Sustainable shop featuring hair accessories, clips, beanies, enamel pins, and bags made from upcycled materials and renewable resources and materials.

Spruce Nail Shop OTR, Walnut Hills
Organic, natural nail and skin services that also sells nail care, skin care, and gifts
Gift idea: curate a nail care set with their glass file and case, cuticle serum, and hand lotion (this would be great for stocking stuffers or for a local gift exchange)

Launch Party OTR
Independent skincare and beauty boutique purveying hand-picked beauty products from small businesses you’ll love to support

Consumables

Instead of buying more things, I recommend getting a gift card to a small business or restaurant so that they can try a new place or patronize a favorite. A gift card may not seem fun, but I assure you that they are practical.

Consider a tea sampler from Churchill’s Fine Teas; coffee beans and a mug from a local coffee shop or roaster such as Coffee Emporium, Deeper Roots, and Urbana Cafe; Cincinnati FoodieCards; or spices from Colonel De’s in Findlay Market.

Experiences

Cincinnati Food Tours
Cincinnati’s original food tour experience, with more than a dozen public tour options, including Findlay Market, OTR, along the streetcar line, Pendleton, Hyde Park, Walnut Hills, and more. Private tours are also available.

The Cooking School at Jungle Jim’s
Offering hands-on and demonstration courses for all skill levels plus private events for up to 12 people. Click here to view the class listing.

Tablespoon Cooking Company
Cooking classes for every kind of cook—all skill levels are able to experience the joy of cooking through interactive in-person cooking classes. View the class listing here.

Check out Findlay Market for one of their many events, a free tour, or retail goods.

Kid-Friendly

Joseph-Beth, King Arthur’s Court Toys, Learning Express Toys and Gifts, and Stoney’s Village Toy Shoppe all have toys, games, and activities for young people of all ages, including STEAM toys, board games, puzzles, and so much more.

Handzy Shop + Studio, in Covington, sells beautiful and thoughtful goods for babies and toddlers, such as apparel, toys, and games.

You can also head to O’Bryonville for LilyPad, where you engage children through purposeful play, classes, parties, and other events; Northside to enjoy an afternoon or make a donation on behalf of your gift recipient at Happen, Inc.

Markets and Craft Fairs

Patronize local and regional vendors and local food trucks at Cincinnati’s famed urban flea market, The City Flea (dates TBD) as well as The OFF Market Holiday Market, Art on Vine in November and December and Crafty Supermarket, the latter will be back in the Music Hall Ballroom featuring dozens of makers—local and regional—on November 29.

More area craft shows and various flea markets can be found here.

DON’T MISS OUT ON GOINGS-ON IN CINCINNATI EVERY WEEKEND. HEAD TO TOURDECINCINNATI.COM WHERE YOU WILL BE PROMPTED TO SUBSCRIBE TO THE WEEKEND RUNDOWN NEWSLETTER!

Artwork

If you’re looking to give the gift of local art, ideas include James Billiter (letterpress, woodcut, greeting cards, cross stitch, etc.), Janneke Beuerlein Art (abstract visual artist), Ellebrux (jewelry, fine art, and handmade gifts), and Gee Horton(hyperrealist visual artist). Work by James Billiter and Ellebrux can be found at The City Flea and various shops in greater Cincinnati. You can also support local institution Rookwood Pottery or give the gift of classes to Queen City Clay.

Fabulous Frames & Art is not only the world’s largest Charley Harper dealer, it also features custom framing and Rookwood and Cincinnati gifts. Visit one of their four Cincinnati locations to see their goods.

Pets

Our four-legged friends are family and, thus, we like to spoil them as such. I recommend doing so at Argos All-Natural Pet Food and Supply, Findlay Market, Fuzzybutts Dry Goods, Jungle Jim’s Market, or by finding your neighborhood Pet Wants. Brewhaus Dog Bones is a not-for-profit company dedicated to providing vocational training for young adults with disabilities. Their handcrafted treats are oven baked from whole grains sourced from local microbreweries. For a complete list of community vendors where they are sold, click here.

Support Local

This is only a shortlist of ideas for shopping local this year, and is hardly a dent in every option that our city has to offer. Get out and explore, and contribute to our local economy. There are several destinations and neighborhoods in the area that offer business districts with many options for shopping local for gifts (Christmas, birthday, anniversary, retirement, housewarming, etc.), including College Hill, Covington, East Walnut Hills, Findlay Market, Hamilton, Loveland, Northside, Oakley, OTR, Westwood, and many, many more. Grab coffee and a meal in one of Greater Cincinnati’s wonderful neighborhoods this holiday season and beyond and hit up the surrounding shops.

LET THE FARE FREE CONNECTOR, METRO, RED BIKE, OR AN ELECTRIC SCOOTER CONNECT YOUR TRIP TO SHOPS, RESTAURANTS, PARKS, AND DRINKERIES WHEN YOU SPEND TIME IN THE URBAN CORE.

TO SUPPORT BLACK-OWNED BUSINESSES, CHECK OUT THIS COMPREHENSIVE LIST OF BLACK-OWNED BUSINESSES IN CINCINNATI, INCLUDING FOOD + DRINK AND RETAIL. FOR ASIAN-OWNED BUSINESSES TO SUPPORT AROUND CINCINNATI, CLICK HERE. THERE IS ALSO AN LGBTQ+-OWNED BUSINESS LIST AVAILABLE HERE.

If you ever want or need custom recommendations for gifts, just ask by messaging me on Instagram or Facebook, or by emailing tourdecincinnati@gmail.com.

[Updated 10/26/2025]