Spotlight your Business
Apply for our Spring Spotlights
Ready to turn heads this spring? Around The Corner is on the hunt for local storefronts and pop-up vendors to feature in our Spring Spotlights — a series designed to shine the light on the best our community has to offer.
And the best part? It’s 100% free — because supporting small & local is what we love to do.
What You Get:
A feature on the website blog + our social channels
Featured tag in our new tool launching this season
Professional photos + a short video — yours to keep + use (just credit me!)
Cross-promotion galore — We’ll be hyping you up, and you can do the same (because when we rise together, we shine brighter!)
Web-presence review & recommendations with first-look access to our free resource hub - giving you the tools to grow your business!
Note from Maggie to fellow business owners: No quid pro quo here. We aren’t going to pitch you a photo/video package when we get in the door or expect to upsell you on marketing services. This is made to be a free act of service to businesses we love. If someone tells you otherwise, please reach out to me directly @aroundthecornerilm or @maggiependergrass on socials or at hello@aroundthecornerilm.com.
How to Qualify:
Location: You must have a physical storefront or be a pop-up vendor (like food trucks, coffee carts, or market booths) located within 30 miles of Wilmington proper.
For our service-based businesses, we have updates coming soon for how you can take advantage of spotlights later this summer.
Active Online Presence: An active social channel or website is a must, so we can share your story and help amplify it even further together.
Member of our Directory: An updated AtC Directory listing is required
Terms: Must sign a simple contract agreeing to usage rights and crediting our work when sharing content.
What We’re Looking For:
Diverse Voices, Unique Stories: We want to highlight a mix of business types, backgrounds, and impact on our community. We’re excited to feature businesses that are minority-owned, women-owned, LGBTQ+-owned, first-generation, or have a unique story to tell.
Community Mover: We’re looking for spots that are active in the local scene — whether you’re showing up at markets, hosting events, collaborating with other businesses, or doing your thing in a way that lifts the Cape Fear Region.
A Growing Business: Whether you’ve been around for 6 months or 60 years, this is built to be a way to grow that content library and get some visibility!
What We Need From You:
Apply Using the Form Below: We’re going to ask you a few basics about your business so we can get to know each other a bit. Take your time applying (we recommend tracking your responses in a separate document so you can reference in the future).
Hold Tight: Selections will be notified by the end of May, and we’ll be scheduling content sessions at that time.
If you aren’t selected, we will keep you in consideration for our summer spotlight applications starting in June, where more spots will be available. If for some reason we aren’t able to schedule a spotlight for a chosen business, you’ll be the first in line.
Prepping for your Spotlight Session:
Review your application responses: We’ll use these to help draft your feature on our site. You’ll have a chance to review and tweak things in person, but having any updates ready beforehand will help us stay on track.
Prep your space: Take a little time to tidy up and pull any products or items you’d love to showcase. Think about what makes your business shine — feel free to jot down a quick shot list of anything specific you want captured. Don’t worry if you get stuck — we’ll bring plenty of ideas too!
Note: If you’re a food or drink business, think about any seasonal specials, best-sellers, or signature items you want to highlight. We don’t expect free food/drink while we’re there, but it is appreciated & will be disclosed as a part of our post.
Stay open for business: No need to close your doors! We’ll bring a “Photo & Video In Progress” sign to let customers know what’s happening. We keep things low-key, so there’s no need to move inventory or make space for big equipment.
Have someone onsite to represent your business: Ideally, that’s you (the owner/manager), but we get that running businesses leaves little free time, it could also be a featured employee who knows the ins and outs. We’ll ask a few casual questions and may get some footage of the team in action.
Timeline: We’re anticipating on having an initial draft within 3-5 business days of the shoot. We ask that you review and respond within 3 business days with any feedback to ensure we can keep things moving and scheduled.