#ShopStamford blocked from Instagram by Meta

A social media tag that helps promote independent businesses has been blocked by Meta.

The #ShopStamford tag has had 90,000 uses on Instagram, helping to highlight what’s new among retailers in and around Stamford.

But last week the tag was stopped on Instagram by Meta, which also owns Facebook.

This means people searching Instagram for posts tagged #ShopStamford comes up with none found, and adding the hashtag to a new post does nothing.

Sarah Sewell, who founded the #ShopStamford initiative in 2017 and looks after its social media, spoke of her frustration over Meta’s actions, and said she tried to contact the company over the weekend to point out the problem.

She said: “People have told me it takes ages for Meta to respond to requests and so I’m hoping someone will know a way to get a hashtag unblocked quickly, so that we can continue to promote local businesses and events.”

The hashtag has been used to draw attention to events such as Stamford Santa Fun Run, which is on December 8 this year, as well as late-night shopping and Christmas markets.

Sarah, who runs Energy Clothing in Ironmonger Street, said the #ShopStamford tag still works on Facebook and that she was unsure why Meta has blocked it from Instagram.