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Pages of Hackney in East London will today hold what is being billed as London’s first ever Cash Mob event.
Following a social network campaign on Facebook and Twitter, at 1pm today flurries of people are expected to enter the independent bookshop in “flash mob” style, to spend a predetermined amount of money in order to support the shop as a local business and raise its profile online and in the community.
Pages of Hackney owner Eleanor Lowenthal said a public interest company called Fenton first got in touch with her to organise the event after news London’s Olympic Games had not proved very fruitful for local businesses.
Lowenthal said: “I don’t know what is going to happen or how many people will turn up today—it could be 12 or 500, but the idea is to help businesses be more self-sufficient and encourage people into shops in more creative ways.
“The reason why I wanted to take part are two-fold, one is to boost trade but another is in the long term to raise our profile more generally and keep it going.”
Lowenthal said she would not be discounting anything in the shop for the event because it was “against our ethos” but added lots of press were expected to attend the event to record London’s first cash mob experience.
“The idea is also to support local businesses which have been impacted by the Olympics so they wanted to do something for businesses in the borough,” she said.
On the Cashmobbers website, cash mobbing is described as “generally organised by people who enjoy the fun, excitement and novelty of a cash mob, or others who are concerned about the plight of local businesses and want to do something to help.”