Secondhand Birthday Presents

[musicinthewoods]

Interested in mumsnet opinions as RL friend think I a BVVVVU.

DD2 is 2 next month and I've seen a play kitchen on FB marketplace that would be perfect for her- it's £30 and retails around £150 brand new.

My friends think it's totally fine to buy secondhand but not for birthdays/Xmas and that I'm tight.

Full disclosure I am the highest earner of my friendship group and they know this (not a stealth boast- we're good friends for a long time and they've seen my career progress!). I could easily afford the £150 but I don't see the point when the £30 is just as good and the brand new one will be exactly the same after a week of play! 🤷🏻‍♀️plus, she's 2 so wouldn't know (my 11 year old would probably leave home over a second hand birthday present 🙄).

So, AIBU?

P.S I will be the poster that continues to think they are not unreasonable even if you all tell me I am 🤫

My dh just got a second hand switch for my DT. It came from a friend so we knew it would be OK and saved us money to be spent on their party

I think your RL friends are being unreasonable.
It is a win win situation.

Totally fine

Why is it any of your friends business? As with everything to do with parenting, you - the parent - decides.

My favourite birthday present as a child was second hand (my parents couldn't afford new). It was perfect. I bought my then 18 month old twins a 2nd hand play kitchen one Christmas. It was in rather used condition - but not as used as it became after a few months of small child use. 3 plus years later its still a favourite. I buy mostly 2nd hand partly for environmental reasons and partly because it is less annoying when they move on after 2 months.

I bought a wooden kitchen for my daughter. It has all the same key bits as a very expensive brand but I had seen it on the Aldi website for £90 instead of £180. I waited a week and bought it on sale for £45. Both my kids love it and it is sturdy. Yanbu in my opinion, I would buy it and use the extra money to buy accessories for it eg. Kettle, toaster etc.

Yanbu. Saves building the bloody thing for a start!

I bought 3
Fisher Price
Toys at an NCT sale. All 3
Of
My
Kids had those toys for their first birthday. None of them cared they had been reused multiple times. Now the eldest is 18 and it is very different but when they are little they definitely don't need new .

Definitely not unreasonable while they're so young. So long as it's in good condition I don't see a problem with this.

My children's toys, books, bikes and clothes are almost all bought from fb marketplace. All in excellent condition for a couple of £. Saves money, packaging, time in shops. Wins all round! If something is a present for a friend or extended family I buy new or 'as new' but my children don't care if it's not new. They also like a rummage in charity shops and car boots with me occasionally.

YANBU. Plastic can just be wiped down and made clean and good as new, so it’s a really good deal all round!

A two year old won’t have the slightest clue. I buy lots of things secondhand, it’s better for the planet.

Buy the second hand kitchen. Make the most of it while she's still young enough to not care.

Totally with you on this. Second hand all the way whilst I can get away with it.

Absolutely do it. 2nd hand all the way - why ever not?

I bought my three year old an Early Learning Centre garage on Gumtree for his birthday. Played with it for a couple of weeks then didn't bother it - so glad I only a paid a tenner for it.

Do it, save it from landfill!

Second hand stuff is great! And it shows the seeds for later - if they get second hand stuff now, you'll hopefully set them up to reuse stuff later on too!

I've always bought second hand for my boys. Second hand toys, second hand games consoles, second hand games. What's the point in buying new for something they are going to grow out of? For my second child's first 2 Christmas's and birthdays I just wrapped something his brother had grown out of.

I would buy it

I would by the secondhand. I know my husbands family think we're tight as we're both high earners but I just don't see the point in wasting the money. Like you said a new one would look the same in a couple of weeks anyway.

Its better for the environment recycling toys like this. I dont think ive bought my daughter new toys let

Secondhand Brio, exchanged in a supermarket car park, a huge huge lot of it. DP and I built it the night before his birthday so that it ran from his bedroom door right down to where his cake was waiting - it was definitely the best present so far, even several years on. Just the expression in my son’s face!

Of course YANBU. What are they concerned about ?

I don't think dd1 had a single present that was brand new until she was about 5. Not because I couldn't afford presents (I could have bought new, but would have had to cut back on other things), but because she didn't know the difference and it just made sense. She used to get much bigger presents because they were second hand, like a big box of Playmobil for less than half the price of a single set bought new (and the second hand stuff had been built already too, another win!).