Bill Calfee has a mission: to keep local dollars local.
So, in 2020, he founded Myti, a Burlington-based e-commerce site featuring Vermont stores and goods that he pitches as a local alternative to Amazon. The site’s been successful, with 9,000 people on the mailing list, approximately 70 stores enrolled and some 70,000 to 100,000 different items for sale, he said.
Now Calfee has taken the concept to the next level. He has created the Myti Local Finder, a web browser extension that helps shoppers using a national retailer’s e-commerce site to find the item at a local, independently owned store. The browser finds items at stores that are registered with Myti — and ones that aren’t, Calfee said.
“A lot of people don’t realize what’s available around here,” said Calfee, who recently used the extension to find electronic equipment he thought he’d have to order from out of state. “Even the people who are committed to shopping local don’t realize what’s available around here.”
Say, for example, you’re looking for sneakers on the HOKA website. The extension will run a search using your zip code and provide a listing and map of local stores that carry the brand, such as Lenny’s Shoe & Apparel or Skirack.
Calfee launched the extension in November, but early testers found it didn’t function well, he said. The team has worked through some bugs and released a new beta version in March that’s much improved, he said. Because of the company’s concern about data privacy, it only collects a user’s zip code, the search term they use to find an item and whether the user clicks through to a local store.
More than 300 users have downloaded the extension, according to Calfee, who was surprised to see that many live in other parts of the country, including Florida, North Carolina and Colorado. That’s because the extension works anywhere.
“The point is, we want to keep money in local communities everywhere,” he said. The same goes for Myti — once the company proves its model can work in Vermont, Calfee expects to expand it to other places.
The original print version of this article was headlined “Buyers’ Club”
This article appears in Money & Retirement Issue • 2026.
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