Tori Packer is originally from Murwillumbah on the far north coast of NSW, but she moved to Armidale with her husband several years ago to start a family.

"I experienced my first taste of Armidale when I lived at St Albert's College and obtained my degree in teaching at the University of New England 20 years ago," Ms Packers said.

"I had the time of my life here, then spent the next decade travelling the world and soaking up all that life has to offer."

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Ms Packer was aged in her early 30s and living in Bondi when she realised she was ready to settle down and start a family.

"I couldn't think of a town more perfect than Armidale to do it in," she said. "So my husband and I (along with my sister and brother in law) packed our bags in our cars and haven't looked back."

While she teaches at NEGS junior school during the day, Ms Packer is also the founder of The Small Business Community, an Instagram collective with more than 37,000 followers, established in April 2020.

She said being a small business in New England had been 'really tough' in the last few years.

"The drought, followed by the bushfires, followed by COVID hit businesses hard, "Ms Packer said.

"I know many businesses are also struggling with 'the great resignation'.

"It can be a challenge to draw people to a country town, to live and work, if they have no previous ties here."

Ms Packer hopes the aspiration of the new Armidale mayor Sam Coupland to grow the population of Armidale comes to fruition.

"I am extremely excited about our new council and know that they are very keen to support small business," she said.

"I'm on board with this in any capacity I can be."

Ms Packer started The Small Business Community when COVID lockdowns began with an impulsive click on Instagram while she was feeding her baby at 2am.

"Like any other exhausted mum I was deep in the scroll hole on Instagram," she said.

"A local Armidale small business owner had posted about the effect that COVID was having on her business and was calling for people to start their Christmas shopping early.

"My heart dropped. Businesses were literally crippled.

"I knew I had to do something. And, as though it was instinct, I pressed the "create new account" button and began creating an online community to help.

"I felt so much empathy and compassion for our small business owners in town and wanted to help in any capacity I could.

"I knew I didn't have bottomless pockets, so spending money wasn't really an option. But something I was good at was rallying the troops and bringing people together to reach a common goal.

"What began as an idea to help local businesses, soon became a beautiful engaged supportive online community for small business owners nationally."

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The Small Business Community has evolved beyond solely a supportive community for business owners to connect and grow, Ms Packer said, she now teaches businesses how to leverage the power of social media to grow.

"Nothing makes me happier than facilitating others to unlock their inner confidence and grow their business with these incredibly powerful platforms," she said.

"I am on a mission to impact one million small businesses.

"As of June 30 2021, there were more than 2.4 million actively trading businesses in the Australian economy.

"That is a hell of a lot of local economy we will lose if we don't start to actively and consciously support our local Australian businesses."

Ms Packer believes it is important for those contemplating going out on their own to 'start messy'.

"We don't create businesses from thoughts and dreams that stay in our minds. We learn and evolve from action," Ms Packer said.

"In a world where we are connected like never before, a small business owner can reach a global market with the click of a button. Our potential really is infinite.

"I believe when your passion and your mission is strong enough, and when you surround yourself with inspirational people, you really are unstoppable."

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