Save more does not mean buy more!

An unsolicited email from a major discount retailer appeared in my email in box and the re: line read “Fab Frugality” citing free shipping on women’s clothes.

What? Frugality and chain retailers are like vinegar and water!

No doubt the masses will blindly follow and think they are joining the new frugal movement. We’ve become a society that establishes personal identity by literally buying into a “movement”. Frugality, the new black!

The reality? It’s a sad, distorted marketing campaign; veiled consumerism. Frugality, by nature, completely goes against the basic tenets of consumerism. Don’t buy into marketed frugality!

I recently heard a car commercial daring the view to become an original and buy their car. Add to this that I probably watch two to three hours of network TV a week. We don’t even have cable. I’ve no idea what other nonsense is being brainwashed into the minds of the couch-bound, cable-watching consumer. Part of me is curious and the other part is afraid I’ll get so angry that I’ll spontaneously combust.

I once heard a radio show on Frugality talk about a half-off bookseller only to conclude that one could take the money they save and buy another book or go out to lunch! What? Consumerism loves that kind of thinking! Save more? Spend more!

Word up! When practicing frugality, money saved is just that – money saved! Not money spent because you saved. There’s a big difference in philosophy, practice and bank accounts.

Let’s do something simple. Let’s pull up frugality on Dictionary.com:
-economical in use or expenditure; prudently saving or sparing; not wasteful: a frugal manager.
-entailing little expense; requiring few resources; meager; scanty: a frugal meal.

Now, think about it, does buying more because you saved money fit this description? Maybe some times but not all the time. And, I’d say that that small percentage of some times would apply to an item that is a necessity or will be bought in the near future.

Let’s go back to Dictionary.com and look up original:
-arising or proceeding independently of anything else: an original view of history.
-capable of or given to thinking or acting in an independent, creative, or individual manner: an original thinker.
-created, undertaken, or presented for the first time: to give the original performance of a string quartet.

Is there anything original in buying a car based on a TV commercial?

Sheesh! I guess it won’t be long until chain retailers will attempt to entice us to literally buying into their notion of sustainable practices and buy their products.

Ugh! My head just fell into my hands in disgust. Not long after I wrote this, an email just came through from a chain-retailer engaged in supremely unsustainable practices attempting to market sustainable products!

I’m off to take my frustration out in my new raised bed vegetable garden built of re-purposed wood and hardware. I’m prepping the soil and pulling out the rocks. Good thing the rocks I need to be rid of are in my garden and not my head! The more I live, the more I believe that consumerism just dumps retail rocks in the heads of the innocent. Give your head a shake. If you sense there might be any rocks, pound your head like one does when they have water in their ears and get those rocks out.

If you're new to The Thrifty Chicks and agree with this post, you might have interest in an our Op Ed written for The Christian Science Monitor, We count calories. Why not carbon?

Air their dirty laundry

Catherine over at The Vegan Good Life sent me another great story. I’m not a germaphobe, but do draw the line on buying underwear at thrift stores, even though they have the original retail tag still dangling.

I love debunking conventional retail myths. Here’s one on, yup, dirty underwear from The Today Show.

So again, I say wash ALL clothes when you bring them from ANY store.

You just might be paying a full price on something used in conventional retail stores.

So why should thrift be so gross?

Thanks Catherine!

Gottcha!

Catherine over at The Vegan Good Life passed over a piece from ABC’s "Good Morning America", How Clean Are Your New Clothes?. I knew this phenomenon was true from my experiences, once described in the post What’s the bait and where’s the switch. But I didn’t have scientific evidence. This bit of news offers up the possibility of that new blouse, sitting in that shopping bag with fluffed tissue paper and tags still dangling might not be the clean item you think you paid for.

Readers know I’ve been steadily poking holes in the conventional retail notion, “If it’s not new, it’s eww!” This GMA article is but another piece debunking this conventional retail-based (not fact-based) notion that ill-informed consumers are literally buying into.

If this GMA post doesn’t gross you out. I defer to another post, Perhaps new is eww. Human teeth found in “new” products? This stuff sounds more like an archeological dig than a conventional retail store. Or, maybe a TV crime scene.

I’ve been noticing more written articles delicately addressing thrift store aversions. To think some people would consider it a mark of shame to bump into an acquaintance in a thrift store. Good grief! Do we really need to be delicate and soothing about this matter? Are Americans that snobby? All I can offer is my personal experience followed up with a loud “Get over yourself!” I run into my friends at the local thrift like it’s the neighborhood coffee shop. Then again, most of us don’t have cable TV and we do things together like camping. Our children’s clothes are lovingly passed on to friends with younger siblings who proudly wear them. Some of these garments are on their third generation. I guess some Americans would call my daughters deprived considering what I’ve just written combined with the fact that we don’t have a “Wii” to go for a run or hike “we” actually get out side and do it.

As usual, I apologize for being so snarky and, uh, painfully direct. Like I always say, in the words of my family’s matriarch, “Someone’s gotta!”

If you are a new visitor to this blog, be certain to scroll back up and pull up the Thrift Catalog slide show featuring over 240 items. This could give you an idea of what could be waiting for you. Also check to the Table of Blog Contents to read on how to incorporate thrift into your life in Thrift Store Conventions.

Why are two major retailers torturing their own trash?

I couldn't believe it and double-checked it to be true. This Tuesday Jim Dwyer from The New York Times gave us A Clothing Clearance Where More Than Just the Prices Have Been Slashed. Consider Dwyer's short article mandatory reading and please pass it on.

We are aware that retailers, especially giants like WalMart, have stacked decks and play consumers to up purchases (often with items no one needs) and up profit margins for Wall Street. It's sneaky, it's dirty and it sinks consumers into debt so deep they need pressurized submarines for the commute home.

But, this is all front end activity. Who could ever think that retailers would slaughter perfectly fine goods to make them trash? Why not donate them? Could they truly be so childish and think, "If no one will buy this coat, I'll be damned that no one will ever wear this coat and rip it to shreds!"

In the words of Little Pie, "I think that's like torture to the people who need clothes. Winter is a dangerous time for homeless people, they can get hypothermia. They deserve warm clothes." Good grief! My eight year old daughter has more compassion than the lot of companies taking such selfish, ridiculous measures.

Is there retail redemption for such a wasteful act in a time of such pressing need?

Thrift is truly orginal haute couture

"Do people mind that you give used gifts?"

That's a frequent question. As I have written many times, it's hard to discern the origins of my gifts (unless it's clearly vintage) because I free new products from their horrid packaging. Look, this packaging is not designed to delight the recipient, the intention is to slide that product over home plate (the register scanner) to be added on to a score board (a well stacked credit card statement). [Sigh.]

Besides, my friends and family know that I give thrift. But, whenever I surprise someone they look at me with mouth agape. "Where!" they demand. Upon learning they usually follow up with, "I'm going there tomorrow!"

If you are new to thrift, please scroll down and on the left there is a series of posts on How to Thrift. Since thrift has recently been in the news, many reporters, with no thrift experience, have taken weak stabs at "How to thrift." I find 99% of these articles quite lacking. The thrift couture is an entirely separate game from conventional retail. With the exception of paying the cashier, the rules are completely different. Trying to mix them would be like serving goulash and sushi for dinner. Blech! Wonderful separately. But a disaster when mixed.

Mr. Golightly heard this intriguing piece, Second Hand Christmas in France, from Public Radio International's The World. I recommend you listen and be a little more enlightened about other cultures. So, not only do the French eat lovely buttery, creamy treats with fine wine while still managing a lovely figure; but their haute sense of style is due in part to second hand items. However, I learned from a spot on CBS Sunday Morning that the recent rise in the French obesity rate might just be linked, in part, to the rise in sales of Big Mac's in France. [Double sigh.] American influence is not always a plus, well maybe in dress size.

Unfortunately our country, probably by geological design, has a tendency for monoculture. Consumerism has done an amazing job of furthering and filtering a craving for excessive homogeny through nearly every aspect of American culture from chain restaurants to clothing to furniture to home designs. I believe this merely happened because it's cheaper to produce 20,000,000 pairs of the same blue jean design than it is to produce 20,000,000 originals. Let me be plain, I think that kind of sucks and wonder if most Americans really understand what it means to be an original or how we desperately need originals. The idea of being an "original" has even been mass marketed! Come again?

Esteemed author Michael Pollan points out the perils of farming monoculture species in his best seller, The Botany of Desire. This amazing book was made into a PBS documentary. I recommend the both it and the documentary. The documentary is easily viewed online.

I believe Pollan's argument in favor of promoting plant diversity holds true to human culture. Much that plays out in nature plays out in human culture. The parallels are astounding. We need pioneers. We need diversity. We need originals. Else-wise our culture will weaken and problems will be widely homogeneous, like mass obesity, children with brittle bones, mass home foreclosures, mass credit card debt, mass unemployment, dot com bubbles, real estate bubbles, and overdependent reliance on one particular source of energy...I truly believe a healthy culture has diversity on many levels.

If you're a parent, don't follow trends. My best advice to do is to yank the cable TV and dare your child to develop their personal inner interests. Our children really are truly individuals until commercials take hold of them. Let them decide what they enjoy and they will grow up to be originals, pioneers.

If you are a new visitor to this blog, be certain to scroll back up and pull up the Thrift Catalog slide show featuring over 240 items. This could give you an idea of what could be waiting for you. Also check to the Table of Blog Contents to read on how to incorporate thrift into your life in Thrift Store Conventions.

Beware the return receipt, it make you buy and then buy more

We count calories. Why not carbon?

This is one from the archives, it ran in May of 2009 in The Christian Science Monitor. It's wise to pause and reflect. I believe this is what I was discussing with Little Pie while we took a stroll in the Adirondacks one day.

Little Pie is especially concerned about environmental issues. She tells me that "Too many people have let go of the thread that ties them to the earth."

Denver - Thanks to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), I see that my serving of Honey Nut Cheerios has 110 calories. This, along with dozens of other data points on the box, helps me make educated choices to do right by my body. I'm ready to tackle the day as an informed consumer of food.

Wait! That box: What "ingredients" went into that? Ditto for the plastic liner and all those O's: How many "calories" did it take to manufacture them and then ship them to my table? What's the carbon footprint of my breakfast?

At the store, I can compare cereal carbohydrates but I can't compare how much they cost the planet. I'm not empowered to shop right by the health of the planet. I might as well put on a blindfold.

Americans need to broaden their understanding of energy and its cost. Nearly everything in our homes, from toasters to hair dryers, consumes energy (and emits pollution) from start to finish. But we don't think about that. We think that's the job of the energy companies. We turn down the thermostat and buy reusable bags at the grocery store, but that's about it.

Americans are voracious shoppers. We use more than our fair share of resources in this world. To embrace conservation, shouldn't we consider a product's carbon cost? Take appliances. Many come with an Energy Star rating. We all nod and feel good about it. But this label just shows the relative energy cost of ownership, not the absolute cost of manufacture. I wonder if it is confused with the car device OnStar; consumers may think washers have satellite connections offering emergency assistance for grass stains.

Think about all those products that companies dare to call "green." Unlike "organic," which is a federally regulated label, companies can affix "green" to just about anything, even petroleum-based plastic Easter eggs from China! Head slap. The manufacturers can't be trusted – they're colorblind. By "green," they must mean the color of money. Unless they start making edible sofas, this is beyond the FDA's scope, so who is going to settle this issue?

Misconceptions abound. Most runners don't think they have a negative environmental impact. The runner just runs, right? Hats off to Runner's World magazine for taking a hard look at this question in "The Runner's Footprint." The article showed that the carbon cost associated with a shoe's life cycle can be eye-popping. My husband is a runner. Runners don't like air pollution. So I know a shoe's carbon cost would weigh heavily on his choice.

If price and quality were equal, which widget would you buy – the one that cost 10,000 carbon points or 100? From jeans to washing machines, we need a common metric for the pollution costs that products incur during their life cycles. If we can list the nutritional value of a pickled egg, surely we can drive a healthier market and planet through system-cost comparison.

While we wait for that, we don't have to wait to be smarter shoppers. When we spend money on new products, we spend a great many carbon points. But when we buy repurposed goods at thrift stores, we spend close to zero carbon points. We have choices, but we need to be informed to make responsible ones.

I'm sorrry major retailers, say what?

Okay folks, we are in hard times. As of August, the US unemployment rate is 9.6% and it’s on the rise. More layoffs. I’m baffled by the lack of response from the retail market. I don’t watch much TV and we don’t carry cable or dish. But when I do, I see business as usual in commercials and am left feeling deficient because there is no possible way I can go out and live as the television instructs. Retail denial, that's what it is.

We need to reform our retail structure and there has not been one word about in Washington. It's head-scratching to watch this Economy of Excess flap around like a fish trying to get back to water to swim through this deep recession. Retailers, the days of more upon more upon more are behind us. An Economy of Excess is simply not sustainable. It's hurting our pocket books, the economy of our communities, our health and our planet. How do we overhaul this broken retail system?

Retailers don't get it as highlighted in this article brought to me by The Queen of Fifty Cents from the LA Times, "Savers need to resume buying habits to aid recovery, experts say." As far as I'm concerned she is the Queen of the Fiftieth Sense! "Experts" are telling us, who have no money, we need to start spending to get us out of this mess? Do "experts" really think the average American's tiny little pocket book is going to get us out of this mess? Who are these "experts?" I desperately need a job and think I could make a lot more sense and produce a healthier economy than they've been. I want to elbow my way through this crowd and take the helm.

Hey America, it's time to Dump Our Current Retail Mindset! Eventually retailers are going to be forced into change because I need that money for my mortgage payment, not some stupid chocolate fountain or a $90 pair of jeans!

This is reminiscent of the whaling industry scoffing at the prospects that a coal industry would ever take over the need for whale oil. Why everyone needs whale oil!

Stock your stores all you want guys. We cannot feed your registers if we can barely feed ourselves. Many of us cannot even afford your sale racks.

My grandfather grew up in The Great Depression. He honestly tells me he never felt deficient because "we were all in it together." I sense no togetherness here. I sense an odd isolation and a confused fragmentation. I sense identity crisis.

We cannot let times like this pass without it making a permanent mark on our ways. This is a time to suck in some serious life lessons. I wish we could turn back to the days of economic practices of my great grandmother as described in the March 10th post Six Baccarat Tumblers.

I personally like Le Dandy’s Shopper’s Fast.

You are not alone like the TV might like you to think! And this recession is not your fault. Maybe this post sounds a bit angry, but given the path that the American consumer's have been led and being told shopping is patriotic, someone's gotta be! We're none the better for it! In fact, we're jobless and in the hole.

Should you want more on this Economy of Excess and the lessons it MUST teach us, please read Kurt Anderson in the April 6, 2009 issue of TIME The End of Excess: Why this crisis is good for America. Anderson went on to write, "Reset." I've been hoping this book would eventually land on thrift store shelves and I've yet to see it, which possibly means it's something to hold on to. Yeah, new books can land on thrift store shelves in a matter of weeks of release. I was hoping Anderson's cover page feature would have made more stir in the economic dialog. But, I guess the major retailers are going to have to go by the way of the whaling ship captains.

Golightly trips to the mall and what does she see?

I’d burned through my stash of premium scented candles and decided to trip to the local upscale mall. Off to Anthropologie I go to score a few good candles in the back 40 of the store also known as the saleroom. Illume’s Yuzu Mint fragrance gets a big thumbs up and also I bought Sweet Rhubarb. They were $20 but I pay $9.75. That’s $4.75 above my Flinch Point but, hey, this is my one simple luxury. Well, it’s more than a luxury. It’s piece of mind. We have three cats and I am forever in fear that visitors can smell the litter box. The candles come in handy. The other day, I almost didn’t clip any fresh basil because I’d feared the worst. But no, it was just a pungent basil odor, nothing more. I’m not shy about my fears either and will often interrupt good friends to ask, “Do you smell cat pee? You’d tell the truth wouldn’t you?” I’m a bit flakey that way and my friends are used to it.

As I walk out of Anthroplogie I see SALE posted in five-foot tall letters in some garish color over at Urban Outfitters, a younger cousin to Anthropologie. Sale is one of my favorite words, so I’m game. In the kitchenware section I spot something that instantly flashes me back to a comment from Saver Queen from the August 27th post Faux is Foe!

“I also notice styles from antiques or vintage house wares being recreated. I recently noticed a bunch of kitchen products being sold in stores and advertised in magazines that have the "hobnail" look. I wonder why anyone would by modern hobnail items when this style can be found on vintage items that are easily gathered from garage sales or thrift store. For example, hobnail milk glass vases are a dime a dozen.”

Saver Queen is right! But what I saw reproduced at Urban Outfitters made me laugh. I cannot count how many times I seen this covered dish made in the shape of a nut with a squirrel sitting on the lid in thrift stores. It’s usually marked at $2.99 and does not fly off the shelves. So, technically one could wait for a 50% off Saturday and buy it for $1.49. The buyers at Urban Outfitters have a different approach; they are promoting a remake of this head-scratcher of a classic for $18. Don’t believe me? Click Here. If you don't see it on that page to back or forward a page. They keep moving it.

As an aside, on my way out of the mall, I spied a new boutique that caters to uninformed Francophiles. A quick look-see raised my eyebrows to find items I’d seen on the shelves of Goodwill just that week. This shop was selling a certain item at a 500% mark up. Who knew? Thrift shoppers that’s who! All other customers are unsuspecting and are paying heavily for their lack of awareness.

What a strange retail world we shop in.

Oops! I almost forgot. You know how you see all these wonderful candles in Anthropologie alight and resting in a glass container atop sand, birdseed or acorn tops?You can find those containers at thrift stores for $0.99. Or you can pay huge mark ups else ware. Tough choice, but someone's gotta make it. So, say I bought the original at the thrift store on a 50% off Saturday, which run frequently. I could pick the original for about 8% the cost of the remake. Funny, I always thought originals were worth more than remakes.

Faux is foe!

I encounter it all the time. Say it’s a dainty teacup with elaborate crazing and a blurred emblem with letters that look like they might be from a French restaurant long past. I think, “Why, that’s darling!” I am so enraptured by the prospect I fail to note the finish is a bit too shiny, the style too modern. I turn the teacup over to see that cursed Made in China sticker stuck to the object like a canker sore devaluing it and my confidence that I can sniff out a fake. I feel infected.

Why do we have an entire retail movement dedicated to presenting a vintage appearance to NEW products? Isn’t vintage earned? Fading and crazing often accompany use. Add a slight chip to represent honest use. Now that’s a real treasure, a piece of history. With age, don’t we chip and craze? Many cultures place a high value on scuffs and tears; signs of wisdom and experience.

I like to imagine that these items, products, have little souls. Take that fake vintage teacup I referred to and serve it at high tea. THAT teacup, with no experience, would shout, “Help! I’ve never done this before! Quick, I need Valium! Oh, I’m starting to shake and hyperventilate!” Who wants a shaking teacup? While, an old, experienced teacup would lovingly say, “How many lumps of sugar, dear? Milk? Lemon?” The aged, experienced teacup provides comfort.

The fact that manufacturers attempt to create vintage in factories in China is a complete head-scratcher. Add in that people actually buy this stuff and it gets troubling. Now, think about the prices people pay for these new, old-looking items! Is having something that looks old in pristine, new condition a sign of a refined style? I don’t think so. I've fallen prey to this before but those days are gone thanks to the thrift store.

In many ways, thrift stores are a mere reflection of the new product market but with a wonderful dash of estate goods. The fakes run out onto the field but at least there is competition from the originals. In thrift stores we have level playing field and the shopper is referee. I blew an “Out of bounds!” whistle at that fake teacup.

I’m not writing about furniture found in alleys and thrift stores brought back to life by painting and refinishing and sold in boutique home stores. That’s reuse or repurposing. It’s imaginative; art. I’m talking about massed produced furniture that is made to look like its distressed and 100 years old. Good gracious!

I guess it’s somewhat parallel to the American ideals of preserving physical youth. We can’t fight off age. So we suck in Botox and attempt to surround ourselves with objects that look old (like we are) but are new in origin (like we are not). Perhaps we are trying dictate what is agreeable and stylish when it comes to signs of age in both plastic surgery and product manufacturing. Perplexing, no?

If I could wave a magic wand on women and I'd convert crow's feet to peacock feathers. Frown lines would become endeared frauleins to keep your spirit young. Frolicking frauleins to accompany you wherever you go making you laugh and smile, getting richer with age.

How a woman ages is not based in plastic surgery, it is based on her ancestry (genetics), her choice of her lifestyle, the scars from mistakes…In the end shouldn’t our bodies be a part of the book of our lives? I agree that trauma deserves help, but everyday living should be celebrated.

Put an end to this madness! Celebrate age! Say, “No to faux! It's off to the thrift store I go!" Acquire originals and be an original.