Black Friday this year? [Archive] - Simple Living Forums

gimmethesimplelife

11-27-20, 10:37am

Is anyone participating? This year we are passing on in-person and have cut WAY back on spending. For me, $38 even with tax, a Norelco wet/dry shaver from Target. That's it. And no gifting for each other this year. 1/2 of that money gets saved and the other half? Canned goods for a local food bank.

No altruism here per se. It's just that there are so many hurting people in close view in the 85006- and all across America - there are better purposes for money than consumerism. Rob

Teacher Terry

11-27-20, 11:07am

I never participated. I am going to send a box of see’s candy to my friend whose husband just died from Covid because she loves chocolate. I will order online.

Yppej

11-27-20, 11:13am

I went for groceries since the supermarkets are less crowded today. Gifts will all be ordered online.

happystuff

11-27-20, 11:18am

Trying to participate in Buy Nothing Day. Have 1/2 turkey carcass in cp, so will pick that and save the broth, then put last 1/2 in to do later tonight. Want to start decorating a bit, etc. since I actually have the time - lol.

catherine

11-27-20, 4:12pm

Well, usually I never participate in Black Friday, but today DH and I had to return a faulty light fixture to Lowe's and on the way, I asked if we could swing by Michaels so I could get sewing machine needles, and when we got there, we had to stand in a line that was about 30 people deep--it was only then that we remembered it's Black Friday!!

So, while we were in line I looked up Michael's coupons on my iPhone and got 20% off.

Lowe's wasn't bad.

Simplemind

11-27-20, 8:21pm

After leaving retail back in '86, I haven't stepped foot in a store through most of the holiday season. I still remember the thrill of my first on-line orders.

We don't exchange with the kids anymore. They all have their birthdays in December and we give them cash for their birthdays. We have a holiday themed potluck dinner/game night (or have pre-covid) at the beginning of December before schedules get crazy. Started doing that years ago and everybody loves it. Much nicer than exchanging gift cards. Our anniversary is on winter solstice and for the past 15 years or so our gift to each other has been travel.

This year it will just be the two of us sitting back listening to Christmas music and looking at the tree. We can't go anywhere (other than camping) and there isn't anyplace to go out (we are in lockdown.. or a "freeze" as it is called). I started putting cookie tins together today along with some very cute red plaid disposable masks. I'll be sending cookies and masks to my near and dear this year. Gotta laugh about it..... what else can you do?

bae

11-27-20, 10:31pm

I ordered some rye flour.

Tradd

11-28-20, 6:17am

I went cave diving.

rosarugosa

11-28-20, 6:21am

We went grocery shopping. Store wasn't the least bit crowded. We walked in and looked around, and I said to DH "This is great." Then we heard the Christmas music . . . >:(

iris lilies

11-28-20, 10:48am

DH tried to buy steel posts for a deer fence but the farm store didnt have them tall enough. DH is determined to outwit/out-barrier the deer for my lily bed in Hermann.

jp1

11-28-20, 11:24am

DH tried to buy steel posts for a deer fence but the farm store didnt have them tall enough. DH is determined to outwit/out-barrier the deer for my lily bed in Hermann.

Don't fences need to be more than 8 feet high to keep deer out?

LDAHL

11-28-20, 12:20pm

We got a lot of “buy local” messages this year. Personally, I’m not sure that money can be penned up within the city limits that way. It seems to me that all capital is global capital.

I got one email that said “Wait for the next mostly peaceful protest and shop locally”.

ToomuchStuff

11-28-20, 12:39pm

Only once, did I go out on BF, and that was to see what it was like.
I used to hit the courthouse, thinking it wasn't a legal holiday, so I should be able to pay the property taxes for the year, with no line.
So I mailed the property taxes on the new house, and will be mailing the old houses, and cars, Tuesday.
Other then that, something that was on my list for next year, I found out was discontinued/changed, due to a lawsuit. Looking around I only found one place, online, with them in stock and they had four. I jumped at retail price to be done with it.
Now from a work standpoint, Wednesday, is typically the busiest day of the year for us, and then BF is a weird day with people in early (shoppers), or after 5:30 (those that work), and still a normal Friday in income. Not this year. Wednesday was Friday in income (relaxing compared to) and Friday, was more of a normal Thursday (slow, by comparison).

catherine

11-28-20, 12:47pm

We got a lot of “buy local” messages this year. Personally, I’m not sure that money can be penned up within the city limits that way. It seems to me that all capital is global capital.

Not true, if you think about it in terms of direct support of your neighbors as opposed to supporting major multinational corporations. I always tell my kids when they ask what I want for Christmas, to buy from local businesses. This year, it's particularly urgent, given the impact of COVID on small business. I buy my kids stuff from the local arts consignments shop, from Dakin in Vermont, from Snowfarm Vineyard in Vermont, and from Phoenix Books in Burlington. I want those business owners, not Jeff Bezos, to get my Christmas spend.

Alan

11-28-20, 12:56pm

I got one email that said “Wait for the next mostly peaceful protest and shop locally”.I understand "mostly peaceful protests" generally provide 100% off discounts on all items for those attending. They've taken the concept of 'loss leaders' to wild extremes.

LDAHL

11-28-20, 2:11pm

Not true, if you think about it in terms of direct support of your neighbors as opposed to supporting major multinational corporations. I always tell my kids when they ask what I want for Christmas, to buy from local businesses. This year, it's particularly urgent, given the impact of COVID on small business. I buy my kids stuff from the local arts consignments shop, from Dakin in Vermont, from Snowfarm Vineyard in Vermont, and from Phoenix Books in Burlington. I want those business owners, not Jeff Bezos, to get my Christmas spend.

The locally owned businesses hire from the same labor pools, buy from similar supply chains, use the same utilities and bank with the same financial institutions as the corporate owned businesses. Any profits they book could wind up with a small business owner on one side of the street or in dividend checks to a shareholder on the other. Either one is free to spend their income on travel or imported cars. Even if you confine your spending to an arbitrarily chosen geographic area, you can’t confine wealth to any one location. Choosing to benefit one neighbor over another with any given dollar spent strikes me as ethically neutral.

LDAHL

11-28-20, 2:12pm

I understand "mostly peaceful protests" generally provide 100% off discounts on all items for those attending. They've taken the concept of 'loss leaders' to wild extremes.

The purest form of “doorbusters”.

Tybee

11-28-20, 2:23pm

Catherine, we try to buy local for Christmas. This year we are sending gift cards, and one son said do not give him an Amazon gift card, for the kind of reasons you are talking about. Now he wants socks. He is a good soul. I am going to try to knit him a pair--yikes, the pressure is on.

catherine

11-28-20, 4:22pm

The locally owned businesses hire from the same labor pools, buy from similar supply chains, use the same utilities and bank with the same financial institutions as the corporate owned businesses. Any profits they book could wind up with a small business owner on one side of the street or in dividend checks to a shareholder on the other. Either one is free to spend their income on travel or imported cars. Even if you confine your spending to an arbitrarily chosen geographic area, you can’t confine wealth to any one location. Choosing to benefit one neighbor over another with any given dollar spent strikes me as ethically neutral.

So, if 100 people in Burlington choose to buy from Amazon rather than walking into little stores on Church Street and buying Christmas presents there, those small store owners will be just as profitable for Christmas? I doubt it. You have to explain that to me. If I'm a small business owner, I'm hoping the townspeople spend their money at my store.

ApatheticNoMore

11-28-20, 4:41pm

Yea it's pretty self-evident if you spend at local shops it helps keep them in business (if you can get local shops and locally made even better but not so easy). Do I feel obliged to keep them in business? Of course not, and that's good because I CAN'T single-handedly anyway. But if I'm buying things anyway ... So the local shoe store is suffering and I may go back there again, because almost all my shoes (work shoes, walking shoes etc.) except the pair I bought from them recently are falling apart.

iris lilies

11-28-20, 6:10pm

Don't fences need to be more than 8 feet high to keep deer out?

see, this is what I am telling him. But the fence will be 8’ tall. It will have stuff on top tho.

SteveinMN

11-28-20, 7:07pm

We bought some more gift certificates for that B&B we like upstate. I hope we get to use them next year...

Aside from that, nothing. We've got gifts figured out for everyone and there wasn't anything I saw that I just had to have. We've shopped BF before (though never in person) but it all depends on whether there's something we need/want that we don't think will come at a better price any time soon.

LDAHL

11-29-20, 11:25am

catherine

11-29-20, 11:26am

Some of my neighbors work for corporations too.

Privileging one form of business organization over another doesn’t have the effect of somehow sequestering wealth within a community.

It's not granting privilege. It's offering support. And I'm not talking about sequestering wealth. I'm talking about promoting survival.

http://content.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1903632,00.html

And here's an article about how many business have permanently closed because of the pandemic. I'm not worried about Amazon shuttering--in fact, business is booming for them. I'm worried that Burlington's downtown will become a ghost town... Here's a picture of Hope, AK after Walmart and other big box stores came in. DD and I were on a road trip and literally saw tumbleweed rolling down Main Street.

3495

https://www.mynbc5.com/article/yelp-report-140-vermont-businesses-closed-coronavirus-pandemic/33460933

SteveinMN

11-29-20, 12:59pm

If actual research and facts still mean anything, buying from locally-owned businesses is a good thing:

study from Michigan State University Center for Community and Economic Development (https://ced.msu.edu/upload/reports/why%20buy%20local.pdf) (study from 2010 but the reasons haven't changed)

Better Business Bureau, 2019: 10 Ways Small Businesses Benefit Their Local Communities
(https://medium.com/@BBBNWP/10-ways-small-businesses-benefit-their-local-communities-7273380c90a9)
Strong Towns article, 2018 Small Businesses Can Save Your Community
(http://Small Businesses Can Save Your Community)
Institute for Local Self-Reliance, 2016 Why Independent Matters (https://ilsr.org/key-studies-why-local-matters/)

I tried to avoid the sites parroting the same article and to avoid sources that would have a likely or evident interest in promoting local businesses (the Frostbite Falls Chamber of Commerce, etc.). Discuss in small groups, if you like.

jp1

11-30-20, 4:44pm

The locally owned businesses hire from the same labor pools, buy from similar supply chains, use the same utilities and bank with the same financial institutions as the corporate owned businesses. Any profits they book could wind up with a small business owner on one side of the street or in dividend checks to a shareholder on the other. Either one is free to spend their income on travel or imported cars. Even if you confine your spending to an arbitrarily chosen geographic area, you can’t confine wealth to any one location. Choosing to benefit one neighbor over another with any given dollar spent strikes me as ethically neutral.

I suppose it depends on what one is buying. If one were to shop from my friend Gary’s pholography gallery or the gallery SuisiQ works at one is supporting the local artists who then hire local people for other tasks (staff, the handyman to fix plumbing, etc,). If one buys from amazon, not so much money swirling around the local economy beyond the UPS driver’s pocket

ewomack

12-13-20, 6:18pm

I'm really late to this thread, but I had no participation in so-called "Black Friday" this year at all. I try and avoid events that entail numerous irrational consumers descending on a single point of hyperbolic mania. I've found that it suits me well in the long run.

Like others here, I have really cut down spending on inessentials. A book comes my way here and there, but I'm buying almost no "knick-nacky" things like I used to. I find that such things only keep my attention for a few years anyway and then make their way to the donation pile. But does anyone else want this stuff? I don't know.

bae

12-13-20, 9:28pm

But does anyone else want this stuff? I don't know.

Having just cleaned out the houses of two parents-in-law who passed away, I'd say "nobody wants this sorta junk, it's just a burden".

rosarugosa

12-14-20, 5:40am

I think it depends on the stuff and where you are. On my local FB giving group, I see home decor knick-knacks snatched up eagerly. I think stage of life has something to do with it too.
A couple of years ago, I was in a HomeGoods store with my sister. We overheard a young man telling a sales associate that he was looking for stuff, decorative stuff, to fill his new place that was pretty empty. Sis and I joked that we should get his name and address, because we and our friends could set him up very nicely.