Thursday, February 12, 2009

Day 296 of our Green Year: No Impulse Purchases

Months ago, we pledged to limit our purchases by having the purchase questions. As well, we have chosen to reduce our possessions.
Well, we are going to go further and completely cut out our impulse purchases. We do not purchase much on an impulse, very rarely in fact, but never is much better than rarely. we want to have no impulse purchases and that means we are going to use these tips to get rid of our impulse purchases. Impulse purchases can be anything from a fair-trade and organic chocolate bar at the organic store, to buying a DVD.

  • Determine whether or not you need the item, or just want the item. If you want it, then you don't need it and you can ignore the urge to buy it.
  • Stick to your shopping list and stick to your budget, do not deviate from them at all.
  • If there is a new piece of electronics out, don't buy it. Typically new electronics are rushed to the market before they are ready so that the company can profit off of the hype for the product. Unless you want a bunch of bugs in your electronics, wait until later when the price is down and the kinks are worked out.
  • Forget about fads, fashion trends and anything else like that. You may think you want something that everyone else has, but 20 years down the road when you are looking at a picture of yourself, you may not think you made the right decision. Fads are completely useless trends that you should ignore.
  • If you do an impulse buy, find out if the product is green and what effect its ingredients or processes have on the environment. If you do this, you will probably not want to buy the product.