To Buy or not to Buy
by Tao Oliveto, Carrboro, NC
I’ve heard of being addicted to shopping, but what happens when the tables turn? All the information now available about cheap goods manufactured in sweatshops, toxic chemicals in everything from shoelaces to clothing to packaging to anything plastic is enough turn off even the committed consumer. I heard about a Bay Area group last year on TreeHugger, called The Compact, which formed in 2006, pledging to buy nothing new for 365 days. The cooperative, grown to at least 1,800 members, has valued and enjoyed the experience so much that they have extended their pledge for another year. The compact makes of point of saying that they are not out to pass judgment on shoppers, but simply to “bring less stuff into their houses…[and] improve the quality of their lives.” The new things exempt from the pledge are “bare necessities for health and safety” - a concept that in itself asks for a healthy reorganization of perspective.
I didn’t formally take this pledge, but I have mostly avoided buying new for a few years. I admit that regularly haunting thrift stores for clothes has made this semi-fast easier, but I can honestly say I haven’t been to a mall in over 10 years. Oops, wait a minute, there was the Online shopping …the bamboo t-shirts, hemp skirt, hiking boots, two dog collars, a slackline, slippers and a few cds…. Ok, maybe I didn’t quite meet the pledge requirements this year, but I can say that I shopped consciously and with sustainability in mind.
Maybe there is a kind of sub-pledge we can all take more readily? A promise to not Re-Buy? After all, I think there is an accumulation period that helps this all make more sense. For instance, it was several years earlier that I collected the stuff I wanted/needed, like a good backpack, favorite books, blankets and sheets, a camera, a few rugs, good-fitting jeans and yoga pants, outdoor gear, etc.. But, over those years, I learned to want what I have and to resist the urge to “re-buy” the newest and latest to replace my “old” stuff. So, maybe buying new should be looked at as stocking up for the rest of life - something that could lead to a shift towards quality goods that are sustainable rather than cheap goods that are constantly replaced.
May 14th, 2007 at 2:36 pm
Howdy! This is definitely an area I need to work on…badly. My main offense is book purchases and music (a lot through iTunes so I guess that’s relatively low impact). I looked around my garage the other day and saw a lot of stuff that I really don’t need. Some of it I can donate to my PTA Thrift Shop, some of it I have just given away, and some of it I am going to post on FreeCycle. Check ‘em out;
http://www.freecycle.org/
Keep up the good work!
-Bill-
May 23rd, 2007 at 7:38 pm
love your designing tee-shirts. they must be cute, my mother’s quotes always go through my head, and i could hear her saying this, “with a body like tracey anything would look good on her” loved the story……………………………..
October 9th, 2007 at 12:41 pm
[...] Nothing that costs little actually costs little. Knowing this makes it easy for me to shop locally and logically and yes, to pay more in some cases. It’s helps to know I’m accruing a long-term benefit for people and the planet but the immediate reward is simply that it feels good - like I’m participating in something truthful rather than constantly trying to beat an already crooked system. I don’t notice a change in my expenses since I automatically buy less stuff. [...]
December 21st, 2007 at 2:21 pm
[...] year of Buy Nothing New pledge ended, without fanfare, last Fall. As a result, I’m happily hooked on thrift, reused [...]