It’s 10:30 on a Saturday night and you’re sitting in the front row of a fashion show, checking out the flyer for a local boutique that you just pulled out of a gift bag. “I should check this place out,” you murmur, fiddling with a strap on your gladiator sandal. “But first, more champagne.”

With trunk shows, release parties, runway events and open houses occurring almost nightly at boutiques across the Twin Cities, this scene is not uncommon. Shoppers are slowly making the connection between the fashionable events they attend or hear about and the local boutiques they drive by on their morning commute. And local shop owners are starting to realize the value of a (66) good old-fashioned party.

“Events are a reminder to the people who attend that, ‘Oh yeah, Cliché. I should go shopping there next time,’” says Delayna Sundberg, co-owner of (67) Cliché boutique in Minneapolis, which participates in roughly eight fashion shows a year, in addition to monthly in-store trunk shows and art openings. “Marketing is expensive, so we do a lot of promos.”

The year 2009 will likely go down in history as a bummer of a retail year. Stores went out of business or relocated to more prosperous areas. Shoppers pinched pennies and avoided going into boutiques at all. Even Oprah didn’t give out as much free stuff as she normally does. But despite the cash-crunching conditions, certain shops have shone like glittering jewels on a half-price sale rack, and it’s all due to one simple concept: the event.

The best affairs have tasty drinks, pretty people and plenty of stuff to look at, which is where the merchandise comes in. Fewer shops are spending money on marketing, opting instead for a bit of renegade self-promotion: setting up tables at fashion shows, hosting cocktail parties and trunk shows, contributing to gift bags, and holding open houses and fashion crawls. Some boutiques have even scored celebrities to rally the fashionistas—(68) Corset welcomed The Real Housewives of New York City star Bethenny Frankel into the shop to sign copies of her book and help local ladies style their outfits, and (69) STYLEDLIFE is hosting an in-store event Oct. 20–22 with designer Zang Toi, who also appeared on Real Housewives.

Even big runway shows like Voltage: Fashion Amplified are now incorporating pop-up boutiques with merchandise from local shops in an effort to merge the local design scene with the shopping scene. This magazine hosted its own mini-market at International Market Square in September, inviting any and all boutiques and designers to sell their wares, giving shoppers easy access to multiple sellers at once.

Such events are the medium through which boutiques and the local fashion scene collide, especially when they have the stamp of approval from professional party-throwers like (70) l’etoile, an online magazine with the biggest Rolodex in town.

“Drawing attention to independent designers and boutiques is a win-win situation,” says l’etoile editor-in-chief Kate Iverson, who helps promote and produce roughly two events a month. “If the little guys can make enough money to grow and evolve, they’ll eventually be spending that money to take their business to the next level, which means buying more goods and services from the medium guys, who in turn buy from the big guys.”

This fall is already packed with boutique events—a Joynoëlle fashion show in October, an (71) Excelsior & Grand fashion show in November—and what could be more stylish than wearing designs from the shop whose party you’re attending? Buy a dress and attend an event, or buy a dress at the event—either way, you’re giving some love to local businesses and finessing your fall wardrobe