First there was Black Friday, supposedly the biggest shopping day of the year and the official beginning of the holiday shopping season.

Then there was Cyber Monday, a day devoted to online shopping.

Now there’s Small Business Saturday, a timely acknowledgement of the importance of small businesses and shops in our fair cities (sponsored by Amex).

SBS is part of a nationwide campaign to support small business and encourage shoppers to shop local on Saturday, November 27. New York City is actually the first city to issue an official proclamation.

Amex will give the first 10,000 business owners that sign-up $100 of free Facebook advertising. So if you have a small business you might be interested.

Small business is certainly the engine of many Brooklyn communities. It’s also what makes a neighborhood like Park Slope special. What would this neighborhood be without its small, special shops?

Small businesses are also critical to the nation’s overall economy. According to the U.S. Small Business Administration, there were nearly 28 million small businesses in the United States last year, and over the past two decades, they’ve created 65 percent of net new jobs.

And maybe you’ve seen this statistic: for every $100 spent in locally-owned, independent stores, $68 returns to the community through taxes, payroll and other expenditures (according to the small business advocacy group The 350 Project).