My first issue, I decided, was not going to be saving money--I knew how to do that--coupons, watching sales, ect. (I later discovered even more money saving tips which I will share in future blogs). My first issue was, where am I going to get my STUFF?!?! I am blessed in that I live in a larger city where my options were wide open....Target, KMart, Shopko, Walgreens, Barnes and Noble. But what if I wanted to give my business to local places, perhaps in the downtown area?
Clothing wasn't too hard, since I rarely bought new clothes anyways. I get them at garage sales, from friends, and local resale shops. Shortly after my Wal-Mart decision, a Savers opened up in my town. I love shopping there, I can almost always find a great deal (on some beautiful clothes) PLUS I am supporting veterans by shopping there. Do you have a Savers in your area? Check here. The other two main places in my city are Goodwill and Salvation Army, which are both terrific organizations. We also have a handful of locally run resale shops. How did I find them? Google, of course! Try it yourself. Google "resale shops" and your city and state.
Food wasn't too tricky either, since I rarely bought anything but non-perishables at Wal-Mart anyways. I have a hard time eating produce and organic food that is shipped from so far away. I prefer growing my own, shopping at the Farmers Market, and buying from local grocery stores that don't ship from out of country unless it's January and I'm looking for tomatoes (even then, one of the local stores carries tomatoes from about 20 miles away where they grow them year round indoors). I found the trick to buying non-perishables (besides cutting down on them) was coupons (including downloadable ones), watching sales, and not shopping hungry. That's nothing you've not heard before....it's common sense grocery shopping, really. You would be amazed at how much money you can save by just following the rules about not shopping when you're hungry and sticking to your list (oh yeah, making the list AND remembering it is very important as well)! Not sure where to grocery shop in your area? Google "groceries" and your city and state.
Paper products and everyday things like soap? This is where my imagination had to come into play, because honestly, most of those are actually cheaper at Wal-Mart. With "The Story of Stuff" running through my head, I decided we could actually eliminate the use of some paper products. No, I'm not talking about giving up toilet paper, but to me one of the things we eliminated might has well have been that important. I'm talking about paper plates. To a woman who HATES washing dishes, this was a hard decision. But I got a great deal on bulk dishsoap at Fleet Farm, and sucked it up. In fact a $6/ gallon dishsoap will last my son and I almost a year and a half. Every once in a while I splurge on paper plates....like for birthday parties or when I'm knee deep in course work. But I buy cheap ones at the dollar store or store brand ones at Target. Body wash, laundry soap, and lotions are a little more complicated for my family as we have skin problems and can't really buy those products at a discount store anyways. But I do still watch for sales, and I will buy them if they have a good price even if we don't need them at the time. Important lesson here: don't wait until you NEED something to buy it! Watch the prices, because things are almost NEVER on sale when you are in need.
The moral of today's post is pretty simple: use your common sense, your imagination, and refuse to believe that everything is cheaper at Wal-Mart. You might have to plan ahead a bit, which is extremely difficult for some people (like me), but it's worth it.
No comments:
Post a Comment