Exciting Announcement

When I started The Local Tourist over 5 years ago, my idea was to create a neighborhood-based directory so that I could easily find businesses that were within walking distance or a short cab ride. I lived in River North, so that’s where the focus began.

Since then The Local Tourist’s expanded to include downtown Chicago’s other neighborhoods, and to this day it’s still the only website that focuses on the heart of the city. That’s a good thing, and sometimes a bad thing. Often I’ll hear “your site’s great, but when are you bringing TLT to my neighborhood?”

Well, guess what? I’ve teamed up with a new local search engine to do exactly that.

Fave does precisely what I envisioned. You enter what you’re looking for, and where you want to find it, and wahlah! You get a list of businesses that are close to you. Looking for a dentist in Pilsen? What about a realtor in Lisle? Maybe you need a dry cleaner in zip code 60602. Fave lets you search by neighborhood, city, or zip code. And the listings encompass the Chicagoland area! Yes, that means the suburbs too.

What separates Fave from other directories is that a big box store can’t pay to appear in the local listings unless they really are there. Only local places are shown. There are also fun videos that let you really get a feel for a business.

The really great part, what has me so excited, is that you can search for whatever/wherever you want directly from The Local Tourist! I’ve added a search bar to pretty much every page on the site. You can check out things to do downtown, read the latest news or reviews on the blog, check out this week’s featured local band, enter the trivia contest, and also look for a vet or a chiropractor or a shoe repair shop or a grocery store or a gas station.

I’m so excited I need to sit on my hands to keep from clapping. Since that makes it hard to type, I’ll just finish up and let you “look around”.

Theresa

If you subscribe to the newsletter and read the blog, I apologize for the duplicate announcement. I want to make sure I get the word out to as many people as possible!