Gift Ideas from Indie Utah Businesses: Local Artist Sticker Machine

While our holiday experience this year might look like a chapter out of a dystopian novel, we can all fi nd common ground in our venture to make this year’s holiday season as normal as possible. Still, our heart’s genuine desire to practice the love language of gift-giving remains unaffected by these tumultuous times. As we search for the perfect item for that perfect someone, we want to do so safely and invest our precious coin into people—not corporations. Here are seven local creatives and their products that say “I didn’t forget you amid the chaos” in a perfectly handmade way.

If you’re privy to perusing independent Salt Lake businesses, you’ve probably seen the Local Artist Sticker Machines: classic red boxes with push-in quarter payments housing a wealth of bite-sized stickers, each one featuring work from Utah artists. Throughout a few dozen locations in Salt Lake, a handful in Ogden and a pair in St. Louis and Austin, respectively,  these machines offer a fun, bite-sized way to support your local arts community.

For Founder and Owner Natalie Allsup-Edwards (who also runs the Hand Drawn Photobooth), the genesis of the Local Artist Sticker Machine was a lifetime in the making. “I have been an avid sticker collector since I was a kid, and [I] wanted to see more machines with unique offerings instead of the typical licensed stuff you see (like Disney and NFL stickers),” she says. “I would frequent sticker machines and noticed that their offerings very rarely changed. I wanted to create a way to offer stickers that were always fresh and simultaneously create a platform for artists.” And so the Local Artist Sticker Machine was born, a unique and substantive realization of this dream.

More than just the in-store machines, though, stickers found in the Local Artist Sticker Machines are also available via shipments or subscription packages. These monthly subscription services come right to your door and always contain updated stickers from new and exciting artists. “I think that’s a fun gift because it’s not very expensive, but they get a new item in the mail every month,” says Allsup-Edwards.

So if you’re looking for a way to both support your local creative community and give a gift to the art-nerd in your life, the Local Artist Sticker Machines are a great place to start. “I think it’s valuable to create sustainable support for artists of all kinds,” says Allsup-Edwards. “This is a small but meaningful way for us all to enjoy the work of artists from all over the state.” For more information on purchasing or submitting to the Local Artist Sticker Machine, head to their website or Instagram @localartiststickermachine. –Audrey Lockie