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Patagonia
Each year, lots of people promise that this will be the year they cut back on holiday spending, focus on the true meaning of the holidays and end the season without that other holiday tradition: credit card debt.
Some people actually do trade shopping and splurging for caroling and cookie making. But, based on retail sales figures, it appears that most years, most people don’t.
This year is starting off no different: Although many people said they are worried about being able to afford holiday items, Black Friday weekend saw record crowds and higher spending levels than last year.
Lately, some companies and organizations have been trying to make the most of those more altruistic intentions.
On Black Friday, jacket maker Patagonia ran ads urging people NOT to buy its clothes if they didn’t need them.
In a post on the company’s blog, the high-end outdoor clothing maker explained, “It would be hypocritical for us to work for environmental change without encouraging customers to think before they buy.”
It’s an interesting marketing tactic that plays into the company’s longstanding environmental activism, which includes its Common Threads pledge to cut down on waste.
A nonprofit called The Center for the New American Dream also is asking people to take a pledge, this one promising to do things like “give the gift of time” and “consider less gimmicky, less commercial gifts.”
The organization also has a template e-mail where you can invite people to sponsor your pledge by making a donation to the Center for the New American Dream. The group describes itself as helping “Americans consume responsibly to protect the environment, enhance quality of life and promote social justice.”
Kathy Hedge, the group’s deputy director, said about 800 people have signed the pledge so far. Although the organization has in the past offered tips for simplifying the holidays, this is the first year they are offering the pledge. They’re hoping it will make people more likely to keep their commitment to cutting back.
“I think any time you actually make a pledge you’re a little more likely to carry through,” Hedge said.
In 2008, at the height of the recession, we profiled four families who had decided to cut back on their holiday spending.
When we checked back in on them in January, they had mostly kept to their more limited budgets, and they felt good about it. That turned out to be one of the few years when holiday spending actually fell, by 4.4 percent.
Readers, what about you?
Related: Anti-Black Friday actions urged
Leave a Comment:
Yes, I'm spending as usual because in the 13 years I've lived in this country I've never given into the mass commercialization of Christmas/holidays... I've always kept our Christmas simple so there's nothing for me to cut back on! Happy Christmas, everyone!
Yes we are also spending less again this year . We are so sick and tired of big business brain washing us with their BS and over all commercialization of this holliday . They have taken the true meanning out oc CHRISTMASS !!!!
bob
Bob the holidays are whatever you make them. Don't blame the stores if you are that easily brainwashed and forgot what the holidays are about. Personal responsibility.
I wanted the poll option "I didn't spent last Christmas and I'm not spending this Christmas". My wife and I both hate waste in any form, and buying people gifts they don't want just seems like a waste - and I really hate being pressured into acting like I like gifts from other people (sometimes I do, but 90% of the time I don't).
I'm much happier when everyone just shows up to get together and have fun, and leaves off gift buying completely.
Why isn't election day a holiday? America always says democracy is our most sacred right but we do get time off to vote?
That is a good question, indeed. Rather than a holiday, why not vote on weekends or over a 2-day period? In Snohomish County, WA we all vote by mail. It's convenient and you can vote at home. But this thread is about Christmas spending - and to me, I would rather simplify that continue the madness of extra spending.
Check the voting laws in your area. Hopefully you will find that employers are to allow a certain amount of time to vote. If not, start questioning the laws with your elected officials and local voting officials.
Why do you need the whole day off to do something that takes less than 30 minutes?
Joe, some counties/states don't always put the needed number of voting booths at the polling places. Depends on who is in charge of the local/state government at the time. I remember in the last presidential election, in a state controlled by Republicans, that places that would vote liberal there was a complete lack of needed voting booths and in conservative areas too many booths. This is a tactic to make sure the ruling party stays in power.
Students at a university that had arrived at 10 am at the polls to vote still hadn't gotten he chance to vote by 8 pm at night (even with many bailing out of the line) so a judge had to extend the time that polling place was scheduled to stay open.
It doesn't always take just 30 minutes. Some times it can take most of a day. Ask your black friends about this as they most likely have experienced it.
If everyone would give the gifts of the spirit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control, then everyone would have the best Christmas ever.
Sorry but that sounds like the worst Christmas ever. I like stuff i can use.
i like stuff I can use too. Somehow I never seem to get any. All I get is useless junk from Kohls or smelly bath products I end up throwing away as I'm allergic to their strong perfumes. I'd go for the peace and patience from Godbless over the "stuff"
some people just can't do without more stuff, one big screen tv is not enough, they have to have 2. when i was i kid we received 1 gift from our parents and 1 from santa on christmas morning. it was simple and fun. later that night we would all go out to look at christmas lights.
You’re kidding, right Nick? You have only 1 flat screen TV? I have 4 of them, the largest being 70 inches, home theatre system, etc.
I grew up really poor and one of our Christmas pastimes was driving around the wealthier neighborhoods to see all the Christmas displays and other stuff we could never have afforded. So now I’m better off and making up for lost time.
Merry Christmas.
It sounds like you have a small willy and are making up for that. 4 televisions just sounds like a waste of money
That sounds like a lot like our house! We'd get new pajamas the night before and a doll or game the next morning, we'd have more communal family gifts than anything else, like the Sears pool table we got one year. My dad one year bought a bike from a neighbor and refurbished it for me...gifts somehow had a lot more meaning to them then. My kids probably couldn't say what they got last year, but you remember things like that. And yes, we'd go on the Christmas house lights tour in the "rich" neighborhood on the hill.
you went out to look at christmas lights ?? ---- as far as i'm concerned, that is one of the stupidest expenditures and practices related to the christmas season. ----- yeah, let's all cut down on gift-giving, but let's still spend extra money on wasted electricity. ----- please tell me you at least walked to see the lights, not drove.
What's wrong with having more than 1 big screen tv? We have 2, plus each of my boys have their own tv in their bedrooms.
We had 1 TV growing up and then I can remember the color TV being purchased for the Moon Landing in 1969. My parents still have 1 TV.
And people wonder why they are in debt up to their ears with no savings or retirement put away. Makes you wonder how many of them leave the water running was they load their tooth brushes up with about 10 time as much tooth past as the dentist tells you to use.
You must have been really disappointed when the Moon Landing turned out to be in Black and White
That's a little too rich for my blood, considering that out of 400+ channels, there's very little worth watching on TV. But if you can afford it and it makes y'all happy, it's all good... (I guess)
May you all have a wonderful, Merry Christmas.
We're taking the money normally spent on gifts and instead "giving" it to each other in the form of cards that describe a future vacation or getaway.
Instead of giving $500 of junk, I'm giving two nights at a nice hotel in Ireland and dinner at a nice restaurant. It's fun to discuss the potential locations and research the things we'll do when we get there.
Put info about each place on a card, card goes in a box, wrap the box, and under the tree they go... We each pick a few places we'd like to visit in the coming years, so we really don't know which location the other has chosen to gift, so there's still the fun of the surprise. And we don't get clobbered with Christmas debt and vacation debt....
My best friend and I do a "girl's trip" each summer instead of exchanging birthday and Christmas presents. We started doing this when her husband got jealous when I was buying her nicer presents then he was!
I'm baking some gifts for family members except for my sister and son. I just got my son a new bed and my sister is getting something to help with her business. Everyone else gets baked goods - I'm definitely trying to keep it simple this year and every year going forward. I'm working on paying off my debt especially student loans. We also spend a lot of family time together and it's fun!
Let people celebrate, or not, the way they would like, not the way someone else wants them to.
Maybe these folks should mind their own business, and celebrate their way, and let other do the same.
Noble sentiment but pretty hollow. Nobody who can afford Patagonia clothing actually NEEDS clothing. For the price of the jacket in that ad, you could get some poor kid enough clothing to last a year.
(And, BTW, Patagonia is not a "jacket maker." They make all kinds of clothing, including shoes.)
I would have been more impressed if Patagonia had endorsed "Coats for Kids"
Choosing to simplify? Go ahead, simplify. Let others decide for themselves.
Spoken like a member of the 1%.
Buy someone an experience; go on a trip, to a show, or anything. It won't get outgrown, returned, or unused.
or, you could make something useful for them, like knitting them a sweater ---- then they will remember you every time they wear it.
I am spending exactly the same amount I've spent for years now. $200 for 2 adult kids, $200 for 1 daughter-in-law, $100 for a grandkid I've never seen (all in gift cards) and $200 for a boyfriend, that's it. I pretty much detest the season, I'm on the countdown to December 26th!
Bah Humbug.
After clearing out my deceased grandmother's home and finding years' worth of Christmas nicknack's that were never used or just collected dust, my family elected to concentrate on gifts that were predominantly consumables. Special teas or coffees, jam and jellies, even books and music that could be shared are now the norm. Not only do these tend to cost less, they are more appreciated than things we had picked up in the past just to be put in a box and wrapped because we felt compelled to get something, anything if we were less than inspired.
you wouldn't have that problem if the person you were shopping for had a wish-list, and that list includes items they might actually use on a regular basis.
I cringe to say it after the Black Friday ridiculousness, but I am ONLY buying a new TV (limit $400) to replace my 22 y/o Sony on it's last legs. My teenage kids and I agreed that that would be it for us, in fact they both told me I always spent too much on them in the past (definitely children of the "Great Recession"). Crocheting or baking the rest of my gifts, except for toys for several kids, and I'm toning that down and letting their parents get them the fancy stuff.
Here is how I see things going: Shortly after the 25th, we are going to start getting browbeatten by media stories that say retail spening "only" grew a small percentage... or maybe it even fell a little bit. These stories will make it sound like the world is falling and the consumer is NOT meeting expectations and NOT doing what they need to do to get the economy going again. I suspect this is a corporate giant ploy to get to the psyche of the American public to a make them spend, Spend, SPEND!!! My opinion? If I hear retail sales fall, I say that is GOOD news... means people not spending on junk and getting their financial house in order.
Since both my kids are grown, I spend what money I've put aside on stuff to send to deployed military and give to charities that are local (humane society,etc.). It has more meaning that way. My husband and I no longer gift each other on birthdays, etc. - we've been married 37 years & figure we've moved past the need to show how much we care by buying things we really don't need.
plus, if you're like me, once you get to a certain age, there's not really much more in the line of material things you really need anymore.
however...... while i don't expect to receive any gifts from my friends or relatives, i do buy gifts for my grandchildren, usually related to arts and crafts, since i like to encourage whatever talents they might have. ----- any toys i buy for them have to be connected to using their creativity.
Call me crazy, but I would always ask my parents just to give me money, then after Christmas when everything was marked down 50-75%, I would go shopping and buy what I needed and I could get twice as much. The leftover money would go into the bank. It's funny, but when you are holding that money in your hand, it's awfully hard to spend it, and I always came home with more money than I spent.
My wife and I don't have children. We each have 5 living siblings with a small country of nieces/nephews and grand nieces/nephews. We limit gifts to each other to $100.00. Nieces/nephews may or may not get fruit baskets. That's it.
TV's? We have one. I have never allowed one in the bedroom. The bedroom is for sex and sleeping and a TV would interfere with either.
As a business major many years ago I took marketing classes. After the classes I would feel dirty and go home and take a shower (the same with voting now). During commercials I point out the subtle manipulation attempts to my wife. My favorite and most obvious is 'but wait!'.
Experts playing with toys makes me the angriest. Frequent attempts to manipulate children can send me into a frenzy. For the safety of my neighbors, I don't watch news or anything else on Saturday mornings.
My thing to do on Christmas eve and day is to take my therapy dog to the hospital. It has become a personal tradition.
All I want this year is a kindle or a nook. The cheap ones. I can manipulate the font size and read bigger print!
My granchildren (and step-grandchildren in this age of blended families) each get a $25 gift certificate to Amazon or a store they like to shop at. My children and their spouses get a $50 gift certificate to a nice local restaurant and babysitting so they can have a quiet dinner by themselves. That's it. No gift exchanges with siblings, nieces, nephews, aunts, uncles etc. Home made cookies for friends and neigbors. If I see something I know the kids would like during the year I buy it and give it to them right then. I can't afford more just because some sales brochure or church calendar decrees something else. I promised my children that I will not leave them debts when I go.
I live across the country from my family, as does my husband. Each year we send boxes to family that have only local goods. Over the past years we have sent chocolates, honey, jerky, chips, hot sauces and salsa, even fancy local made wine and whiskey. There is no waste since everyone loves treats at Christmas. We are giving our families something they can enjoy and also supporting our local economy.
It makes me sick to see Americans out shopping, if you can cal it that. I call it a feeding frenzy by people who just can not or will not stop to think. Gotta have it, gotta have it, gotta have it! Oh, I'll be the worst Mom, Dad, whomever if I don't get this for xxxx.
It used to be "it's not the size of the gift but the thought that counts". But not anymore! It's the count and size of the gifts; the hell with the thought - just buy, buy, buy!