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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To Agree with Money Saving Expert?

196 replies

backtolifebacktoreality · 10/11/2021 23:08

Martin Lewis said this a few years back. I think it's very very true!

"Christmas has become a retail festival and it shouldn't be. Christmas should be joyous but causes some people unhappiness, debt and worry. Many people feel obliged to buy gifts for others that they know they won't use, with money they don't have, and cause themselves stress they don't need ... The gift of giving can be selfish as it can mis-prioritise people's finances and create a financial burden. If you give a gift to someone they're effectively forced to buy you one back ... It's time for us to get off this gift giving treadmill. Sometimes the best gift is releasing others from the obligation of having to give to you. Let's work together to ban unnecessary Christmas presents ... (However, if you feel you want to give something) Do a Secret Santa or give to charity instead".

OP posts:
lentilsforever · 11/11/2021 08:18

* Let's work together to ban unnecessary Christmas presents*

Fuck off Martin
What’s unnecessary to one person is a wonderful gift to another

WatchingWait · 11/11/2021 08:20

There were tears and foot stamping (from the grown ups)
I'd let them stamp! 😆

Crinkle77 · 11/11/2021 08:26

Totally agree and that's why I hate all the Christmas adverts that people go nuts about. They're just designed to encourage people to buy and eat a load of shit they don't need. Christmas has become about 'stuff' and the true message has become lost.

MamDancer · 11/11/2021 08:28

I think everyone should be given permission to go out and spend what they'd usually spend on presents on themselves.

My adult DC and I started doing this years ago.

TheLeadbetterLife · 11/11/2021 08:30

@Hollyhead

I would like a return to a truer sense of gift giving. I LOVE buying gifts, however only when - I find something I know the recipient would love (this doesn’t always conveniently fit in with the time frame of Christmas/birthday), I can afford it, and that it doesn’t mean I have to receive one back. It’s the reciprocation arrangements that take the joy out of the whole thing for me, it makes it too transactional.
Absolutely this. Gift giving is an important part of human interaction, but it has to mean something other than, “I had to do this, so…”
TeloMere · 11/11/2021 08:34

Some parents just want their children to have lots of presents to unwrap on Christmas Day and take offence when relatives suggest cutting down on gift giving.
They don't care if it's plastic tat that'll never be played with and soon get chucked out, as long as there's a big pile of stuff on The Day.

Ragwort · 11/11/2021 08:35

Totally agree, we exchange very few gifts in our family, not because of the cost but the absolute waste of 'exchanging tat'.

I manage a charity shop and am inundated with unwanted presents after Christmas, most of them do sell so it helps my sales and the charity I work for but what a shame for the people who buy the gifts in the first place. I also volunteer in a Food Bank and we are inundated with unwanted 'Hamper food' every January ... and not always the sort of food that most of our FB users want to eat ... or bottles of alcohol which we cannot distribute.

But ... and this is going to sound judgemental - there is a huge pressure about buying gifts and indulging DC that is very hard for some people to shake off, as if they feel 'judged' for not spending enough. I was talking to a FB user this week and she was worried about the cost of a Christmas, obviously I understand that she wants to buy for her DC but she was talking about gifts for distant relatives that 'she has to buy for', I tried to gently point out that if her relatives knew she was having to use a FB every week surely they wouldn't expect presents .... Sad.

NeonShortsInWinter · 11/11/2021 08:42

Dh and I rarely buy gifts for each other at Christmas and if we do it is practical stuff like a hat or oven gloves. It is wanted and possibly needed. The children mid-late teens think it is funny.

The children also don't get a pile of presents we tend to make more of a birthday which is individual to that child. From the relatives it is £10 or £20 each and they often club their money together to get something between them. We do swap lists as it is simple and everyone gets what they actually want. It doesn't remove any of the delight in opening it.

My MIL for years would ask us what we wanted and then refused to buy it because it was house stuff, stuff we actually wanted as a newly married couple, where you upgrade your cheap uni stuff to better quality stuff. Eventually after years of trying to tell her we really would like a Circulon pan she did start doing it. We still have the Mermaid roasting tin from 20 years ago. Still a great roaster. Grin

I despair when I hear of children getting literal piles of presents. We don't equate love with what someone buys for you.

MrTulkingIsFeelingHorny · 11/11/2021 08:44

My siblings and I agreed some time ago not to do Christmas presents (not least as some of us are on a tighter budget than others). Instead, we get together for a cheapo lunch and a bottle of wine in spring (no partners invited - just us). Far nicer than buying one another presents that we could buy for ourselves, if we really wanted them.

I do buy presents for people, but I tend to see something that I think X would like, and then give it to them regardless of when it is.

DC are now older so just want money!

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 11/11/2021 08:46

He's right. So much of what is given is overpriced and not really worth having. We see it every year on MN in the days following Christmas.

I put a huge amount of time and effort into giving everyone a carefully chosen present and in return I got either nothing or something impersonal or cheap tat. AIBU to feel really upset?

Yet again my SIL has given us all home-made presents even though I have tried to explain nobody here eats jam or chutney and even if we did I know she has abysmal standards of hygiene so I wouldn't eat her stuff anyway.

Etc etc.

LolaSmiles · 11/11/2021 08:47

We buy for immediate family (parents, grandparents, siblings) only and it works well. Each year my siblings and I agree on a price limit for each other and suggestions of things we'd like so that gifts are useful.

Not everyone quite gets the memo about fewer items that are more useful/better quality, but on the whole it's good for having a tat reduced Christmas.

DoormatBob · 11/11/2021 08:48

I hate the whole forced present swapping nonsense between adults, completely pointless.

I always remember a comment a woman I work with made a few years ago. She was shopping late Nov with her DH and he saw something he wanted, some kind of tech product I think. He was set to buy it when she said to him "I'll get you that for Christmas". He then has to wait 4 weeks to unwrap this item on Christmas Day. Absolutely pointless tick box exercise!

That just sticks with me as highlighting how ridiculous the whole concept of adult Christmas gifts can be.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 11/11/2021 08:49

@TeloMere

Some parents just want their children to have lots of presents to unwrap on Christmas Day and take offence when relatives suggest cutting down on gift giving. They don't care if it's plastic tat that'll never be played with and soon get chucked out, as long as there's a big pile of stuff on The Day.
Facebook has a lot to answer for. I'm not on it but I gather from MN that there's a lot of pressure on/from some parents to put up pictures of children surrounded by a mountain of gifts. I don't suppose it goes down well to respond with remarks about going green and trying to avoid plastic.
Cosyblankets · 11/11/2021 08:50

Fully agree with all this
We stopped it between adults years ago and now with very few exceptions we just buy for the children. But I limit what I buy to books that kind of thing rather than plastic tat if I can help it.
My husband and I buy for each other but it will be something we need like a coat or something or an experience like tickets to an event or a weekend away.
I can't stand seeing the pictures on Facebook of the piles of presents under the tree that have just got out of hand.

hennybeans · 11/11/2021 08:50

Completely agree. We can't be living like this anymore as a planet.
I don't exchange gifts with my family as we're all over the world. Only post my mum a small Christmas cake as she doesn't have them where she is and usually a school photo of the DC.
My in-laws all exchange gifts: nieces, nephews, their partners, their DC. Every year I say to DH, this is the last year I'll buy gifts. But my sister in law has hers done and dusted by September/ October so it's always too late to suggest. And as it's not my family, I feel a bit awkward suggesting they all stop gift giving. But I have real resentment building as I just don't want anymore tat. It's all such a waste of resources.

bumbleymummy · 11/11/2021 08:51

I agree too. It’s getting out of hand. We do secret Santa now for the grownups and just buy for nieces/nephews. I know it’s not a popular opinion but I really like wishlists too! I would much rather get someone something that they like/want than try to guess, get it wrong and have it go to waste.

Chrispackhamspoodle · 11/11/2021 08:52

We only buy for children and do a secret santa with our family.£20 limit.I'm going to suggest book,bottle or jar this year so it is either read,eaten or washed with and can be recycled.The children are a different matter although it's easier now they are older to get things they will use and need.

IARTNS · 11/11/2021 08:53

I definitely agree with this, I feel like I come across as ungrateful sometimes as I tell people I would rather have nothing than be bought something for the sake of buying me anything.

bumbleymummy · 11/11/2021 08:54

@Chrispackhamspoodle

We only buy for children and do a secret santa with our family.£20 limit.I'm going to suggest book,bottle or jar this year so it is either read,eaten or washed with and can be recycled.The children are a different matter although it's easier now they are older to get things they will use and need.
I like that idea! :)
GoodnightGrandma · 11/11/2021 08:54

@IARTNS

I definitely agree with this, I feel like I come across as ungrateful sometimes as I tell people I would rather have nothing than be bought something for the sake of buying me anything.
This is me exactly ! I get so mad about it. Keep your money and your present so I don’t feel bad for feeling ungrateful.
TheCategoryIs · 11/11/2021 08:54

Last year as it was the pandemic and a) a risk of not even seeing anyone and b) it felt a bit odd to be buying frivolous presents when the whole world seemed to be on its knees, we suggested making charity donations instead of presents (not counting kids).

I’m glad we did it and would like to do it again but did sense an element of us being viewed as pious, eccentric killjoys. It’s strange the way some adults seem so taken with presents given you either specify (in which case you might as well buy it yourself with the money you are not spending on someone else) or you gamble that someone else nails it (which imo rarely happens, hence the charity shops after Christmas).

Christmas is for kids, they have no means to buy what they want. But clearly the nostalgia for being a kid at Christmas is hard to shake off, no matter how much disappointing tat you receive and how queasy it makes you feel for the environment.

Skinnytailedsquirrel · 11/11/2021 08:55

I agree with MSE. We stopped the ridiculousness years ago. Don't go near the shops and the madness and try to escape on holiday. No stress.

During Covid we just hunkered down in the house and went on a nice long walk and stopped for a curry in town at night.

ancientgran · 11/11/2021 08:55

Well I was born in the 1950s, my father was from a big family, I was the 5th GC on that side of the family, by the time I was 6 there were 12 of us and one of my aunts said, "Let's stop doing presents, it's just too much." They had already cut down to just doing children's presents a few years earlier. My mother was so relieved, she didn't want to suggest it as my and my older siblings had been getting presents off them all for years.

Not a new idea.

Normando91 · 11/11/2021 08:57

I’m on maternity this year and our finances are dire. We’ve already had the conversation with family not to buy us anything and if they want to get our son something, to keep it small and something he needs rather than pointless toys as he’s only 6 months. We’ve explained our gift will probably be something like a keepsake, a nice framed photo of them with our son and some chocolates. I go usually go overboard at Christmas so this could be a good time to nip that in the bud and start buying small token gifts people will cherish rather than loads of tat they might never make use of.

clatterclatter · 11/11/2021 08:59

As a few previous posters mentioned go and stand in your local supermarket seasonal aisle or in Home Bargains and you’ll see what he’s getting at. Rows and rows of Nivea gift sets, lynx gift sets, dove gift sets. Who wants this? Literally no one and still it all gets bought and ends up in the bin.

I end up with mini mirrors as a stocking filler every year. I don’t even go anywhere! It’s literally tat.