Happy No New Stuff Year - The support thread for those flying in the face of consumerism!

[WewishyouaBUMPERLICIOUS]

My husband and I have set ourselves a challenge of not buying any new stuff for 6 months. Obvious exceptions are food, cleaning products and toiletries. Also outside of the rules are items that it would be detrimental to buy second hand for my 6mo baby, i.e. cot mattress, dummies etc.

I posted about this a couple of months ago, and have also noticed some posts on the style and beauty threads proposing the same thing. So this is the thread for those who want to join this challenge in some way, whether it be just buying no new clothes, buying nothing new at all, buying nothing at all, buying only second hand etc. Our motivation are different, for some it will be saving money (me), for others it may be flying in the face of rampant consumerism (me) and for others is may be trying to mitigate their impact upon the environment and in protest against the poorly treated workers producing the dirt cheap goods we come to expect today (also me!).

This thread could be invaluable support, with links to various recycling websites, tips on altering your clothes to liven up your wardrobe, advice to stop yourself frittering money on non-fat lattes and a pain au chocolate each day on the way to work and support to tell you "no you don't need a new lipstick - here's how to make your own!"

So come one come all: I dare you to set yourself this challenge and not buy anything new for as long as possible!

LOL at CALM and the prissy local cafes! You set your own rule my lovely - you don't have to justify it to us!

I'm with you on the student loan doesn't count either! I just look at it as a kind of tax! It also fills me with hope that you are doing financially well despite not working and having three kids. I have been married a year, have a new baby and though I am on maternity leave I have a pretty good job, but I am in more debt than I ever was in my 5 years as a student. I guess that'll be the husband, the baby and moving from North Wales to a very expensive town!

I'll be interested to hear how you do it during the course of this thread.

I have kind of ballsed up ALREADY this year. I have just accidentally spent £50 at Purlescence, aaargh. I CAN justify it, but then I ALWAYS can, somehow . Here goes: aside from the fact that its my combined birthday and xmas money from various kind people -its birthday presents for 3 people and tools to make another few birthday present,

(Brittany birch dpns for £3 each! Its scarcely MY fault, is it? )

aaaargh but its also a bag I've been coveting for about 5 months, aaargh. BUT its fairtrade! And I don't actually HAVE a proper bag of any kind, just a few ONYA bags...AND I've been looking in the charity shops for months! AND...

But I had also decided that I wouldn't get this bag. £6 off the price shouldn't make a difference.

Was reading in Not Buying It of this concept of "spaving". This is where you buy something because it is so cheap that you cannot afford NOT to. Eg buying a cd player in the sales for £12, because it is £12, although you have a cd player already, that sort of thing. I think there is a little of that in my purchase today. Yes I can justify it, I always can. But the fact is, I decided that I wouldn't buy this bag at full price, NOT because of the price, but because I have several ONYA bags, and they do the job pretty well, so I don't NEED a shoulder bag. So my decision to buy today was based on price, not need. And furthermore, if I am honest, it was based on the price reduction, not whether I'd normally pay £21 for this bag (its ethically traded, and I'd rather that than it came from GAP, but I think it would still have been better not to buy and given the money to charity)

What is kind of interesting to me is that I did enjoy buying it quite a lot. And now I am happy every time I think that the postie will be arriving with it at some point.

For the people hanging out in cafes -- I used to do that, but then my local library installed a coffee machine. OK, its not great coffee, but only 40p and works as a caffeine fix and no temptation to buy cakes etc.

How about lobbying your local library to install a coffee machine?

What should we do about upcoming kids birthdays (not ours)? I mean its one thing to give our kids stuff from charity shops, but not sure how other kids or parents would perceive it.

I didn't go to the boxing day sales. I did buy ds his school uniform 3 months early to save 20% though.

I am only buying clothes that have been made in NZ (as I live here) TBH they are so much more expensive that it also means I am only buying second hand clothes for me. I sell all ds's clothing on Trade Me, so presumably it all gets used again.

I have a bike with a tandem bit and am making any journeys of under say 10km (and involving minimum luggage) with ds pedalling away furiously on the back. When he starts school he will be doing his school run on 3 wheels not 4.

I am trying to buy more food that was grown locally, or buying fair trade for stuff that won't grow here.

I never buy books for me or dh - that's what libraries are for. Ds does get books, but again when he's finished with them they will be donated or sold on.

My motivation is to try and make sure that the money I do spend stays in NZ, then maybe companies will stop whinging about the high export dollar and realise that they have 4 million people on their door step to sell to. Every time I find something I like and reward them with my business they move production off shore. Argh!

falalalisa, I have a few childrens gifts stashed away already presents my dcs never played with themselves and to others I will give cash, I think young children get a big kick out of it and it teaches them the value of stuff, or book tokens, maybe with a small box of homemade fudge or something similar.

CALM = are you
It's the knitting and the love of Starbucks that we share....
I am Pruni

pruni-oh yes I am a moomin knitter (am in the MumsKnitter group on Ravelry if you need more clues), I was outed in RL but didn't want to come on here and say "guess what, I've namechanged" because I anticipated drowning in great waves of tumbleweed

Re the libraries and bookmooch-am impressed with people who can use them. My problem is that they just don't really have what I want,tbh. They don't have the knitting books I want (barbara walker's stitch guides, elizabeth zimmerman, etc). But my library is crap for anything really, they don't have up to date political/economic/sciency stuff either. And interlibrary loans are something daft like £6.

OTOH they are fabulous if you love catherine cookson . Bookmooch has the same problem from what I can see...

oh but knitters who want fabulous, free technical info, aside from Ravelry, have you all see techknitter ?

My libraries are fab but I am in Edinburgh

CALM nice to see you back! I am not giving up Starbuck's either

Well, had a big test today: there was a clock in Sainsburys that I liked, and we nearly bought it for the dining room (just decorated last year and we need a clock). But at the last minute I said NO but also

Did buy a new spatula to replace the one I accidentally shredded in the food processor over xmas though . Didn't fancy a 2nd hand one og those somehow

wd jammy

Update: £0 spent!

DH quite keen on the idea in general and we just drew up some rules. mine include no new books, no magazines and only neccesary toiletries. plus meal planning and weekly shop.

just finished work to start mat leave for first baby. big lifestyle change that i'm hoping will work out cheaper as lots of daily expenses on silly stuff. but dont doubt new temptations will rear heads!

only thing that springs to mind now tho' is preg yoga classes, which was too busy to do before/ £10 a time but def worth it i reckon cause havent been to any ante natal classes and would like to meet other preg people in area...

will have a certain amount of new baby stuff to buy but will do best to freecycle it. nothing flash just need a freezer and a microwave and a cot. and cot bedding. hmmmmm....

gl all and keep up the good work.

I've got to say I am very impressed with bookmooch. I registered about 3 hrs ago and listed 17 books that we don't really want. 5 of them are already in other peoples wish lists and already two people have emailed me to see if I'll ship abroad. It will cost me about £4 for postage but I will earn enough points to get 6 books if they all come from the UK or 3 from abroad. Not bad so thanks for the suggestion and the link.

Last time I sold 12 books on ebay I made about £20 after postage - barely enough to get 2 books at retail price so this looks like a really good way to swap out my unwanted books - just have to resist listing all the ones DW hasn't read yet

YES I did christen you Miffy

and then you go and change it . lol

Edinburgh libraries are great. I have happy memories of the music section in the one on-ar$e...the street with the Elephant House on it (god is it still there, it MUST be), my mind has gone blank. It actually had music in the music section, IIRC, which puts it about 100 points ahead of Cardiff libraries

I watched a biography thingy of JK Rowling yesterday, it had loads of shots of Edinburgh in it, what was really shocking though was that I was bloody well THERE in those cafes when she was writing those books. Not in Nicolson's though, which is where she wrote it, I don't think anyone ever actually went there, did they?

CALM - so THAT's who you are!! I kept thinking you must be a namechanger but couldn't think who!

Dh bought a roasting tin yesterday. However we didn't have one and he was fed up of burning the onions in the bottom of the tin thing we were using ... so I guess we can justify that as a necessary expense.

Anyone use soap nuts or similar alternative to washing powder? any good?

I'm up for this one. Although I exempt myself from the no new clothes thing, simply because I've shrunk out of everything I own and those that fit me are falling apart. Am I allowed?

preganancy yoga doesn't count as a purchase I reckon. For a start you aren't actually using anything that isn't being used anyway, you are supporting a local person (the teacher) earning a living and it's not like you can buy a secondhand yoga lesson - well you could sit in the car park and see what you could overhear I suppose.

miaou, take it you've tried gloop ?

What I can't find is the recipe for just regular washing powder, where you just add soda crystals to, I think, soap flakes. Am not sure how much cheaper than would be than store own brand, and not sure if it would be much more eco-friendly.

I used to do this ages ago, but have gotten crap with it over the years.

I always think soapnuts look interesting, but I don't know where to get them. And eco balls just didn't work for us at all.

One thing is, and I am sure you know this, manurfacturers massively overestimate the amount of powder needed. I routinely use about 1/6 or less of the recommended powder and it is fine (am using ecover or surcare here). Even with nappies, I never used more than around 1/3.

I also normally do a 30 minute quick wash at 30-the only exception used to be nappy washes. Our clothes are absolutely fine, no one says we smell!

re the pregnancy yoga, I think it depends on why you are Not Buying Stuff

I am not really motivated by money saving, though that would be nice. I do need to save money, but for me thats a seperate, depressing thing that I am dealing with as an aside. Saving money isn't really very interesting, IYKWIM.

What is pretty interesting to me is WHY I buy stuff, and thats why I'm doing this. So what is important for me, I think, is not so much NOT to buy stuff, but to think about WHY I am buying stuff.

I think Judith Levine raises a very good point in Not Buying It. She says bascially that consuming is a way of being an adult member of society. It gives you independence. I'd also say that it often allows you to belong. Its part of how we participate in a lot of adult social rituals.

I wouldn't really be inclined to cut down on things that I actually need to feel part of the community. My big thing here is Starbucks, it is somewhere warm and clean that I can go and sit with my kids for, ooh, HOURS and feel like I am out with people but not in an obligated way. And I need that. Of course, part of this is asking whether this is a need or a want. I personally think feeling psychologically connected to the community around you is a need, and especially for mothers with very young kids, who can't access quite a lot of other stuff, it is often necessary to pay for stuff to achieve this.

I think I'd see pregnancy yoga in a similar way. There are cheaper ways to get to know people, certainly, eg the NCT coffee mornings. BUT if yoga is what actually appeals to you, I reckon you're more likely to make friends with people you actually want to stay in contact with there.

GOD I can waffle, sorry. And I know how awful Starbucks is from an ethical POV, but tbh, so are a lot of things.

CALM there was a really interesting documentary series about this: it was called The Century of the Self and was about various things (I didn't see them all) but the bits about how we were all encouraged (as a result of interpretation of Freud's thinking iirc but am no expert by any means) to view ourselves as individuals and do this through consumption and aspiration to luxury was so interesting.

Wikipedia entry here

and available for download here