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S5:E9 - Small-Town People Problems: Competition

Updated: Apr 14


Each season, we’re going to have a few episodes that directly address your small-town people problems. For our first one, we’re starting off with a question from a listener about one of the most common difficulties in small towns: what to do when the neighboring towns treat each other as competition instead of working together.


Sometimes we’ll bring in a guest, sometimes it’ll be a solocast with Rebecca like today’s episode. Do you have your own small-town people challenge? Call in to the show and we’ll address it on-air! 701-203-3337


In this episode, we cover:

  • The three ways we see this competition show up most often

  • Four mindset shifts to help address the problem

Links and Resources Mentioned:

Episode 107 with Melissa Nelson: https://www.growingsmalltowns.org/post/episode107

Small Town Shout-Out!

There’s something in the water in Vergas, Minnesota. A listener wrote in to tell us that Vergas is the kind of community where you can feel the community pride in every single business. They decided that, despite being a destination lake town, they wanted to be more than just a tourist town, so they focus on what it feels like to the people who live there every single day, too. Walk into any business on Main Street and you’ll get the very felt sense that they want you there and you belong there. That’s what it’s all about! Big shout-out to Vergas, Minnesota! 


New Segment Alert!

We think some of the best parts about radio shows and podcasts are listener call-ins, so we’ve decided to make those a part of the Growing Small Towns Podcast. We really, really want to hear from you! We’re introducing two new parts to the show: 

  1. “Small town humblebrags”: Call in and tell us about something amazing you did in your small town so we can celebrate with you. No win is too small—we want to hear it all, and we will be excessively enthusiastic about whatever it is! You can call in for your friends, too, because giving shout-outs is one of our favorite things. 

  2. “Solving Your Small-Town People Challenges”: Have a tough issue in your community? We want to help. Call in and tell us about your problem, and we’ll solve it on an episode of the podcast. Want to remain anonymous? Totally cool, we can be all secretive and stuff. We’re suave like that. 

If you’ve got a humblebrag or a tricky people problem, call 701-203-3337 and leave a message with the deets. We really can’t wait to hear from you! 

Subscribe and Review The Growing Small Towns Show!


Thanks for tuning into this week’s episode of The Growing Small Towns Show! If the information in our conversations and interviews has helped you in your small town, please click on the images below for Apple Podcasts, Stitcher or Spotify, subscribe to the show, and leave us an honest review. Your reviews and feedback will not only help us continue to deliver relevant, helpful content, but it will also help us reach even more small-town trailblazers just like you!




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