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How to Spend Smarter This Holiday Season

by Kelly Whalen on November 13, 2009

in Consumer

Over the next couple of weeks, six finalists will be auditioning for the opening of “staff writer” at Consumerism Commentary. Each will be providing two guest articles to share with readers. After the six writers have shared their guest articles, readers will have an opportunity to provide feedback before we select the staff writer.

This article is presented by Kelly Whalen, a mostly stay-at-home mom who writes about personal finance at The Centsible Life.

News that the recession may be over has many retailers hoping that American consumers will open their purses and wallets and spend more this holiday season.

Frugality has been popular during the recession, so retailers are targeting your frugal side to make sales. This holiday season will see a rash of new promotions and coupons aimed at your frugal side.

Several retailers are starting to offer “Pre-Black Friday” deals. Amazon.com for instance offered several electronics deals on November 7th. Even upscale retailers such a Pottery Barn are offering more items with free shipping, and a larger selection of sale items to draw more consumers. While many retailers, like Crate & Barrel, have free shipping on purchases over a certain dollar amount. Crate and Barrel’s offer is free shipping on orders over $100 between Oct. 15 and Dec. 22, 2009.

Despite the draw of deals, most Americans will be spending less this year on holiday gift giving. Of those I informally polled, no one said they would be spending more than they had in the past, and the majority of people had 3 methods for reducing spending this year:

  1. Shorten the list: Shopping for fewer people topped the list of ways to reduce holiday spending. Co-workers, hostess gifts, and other small gifts can really add up.
  2. Handmade gifts: Most people will understand your budget is a tight, and would rather have your award winning brownies than $20 worth of too pretty to use speciality soaps.
  3. Smarter spending: The best way to save money this holiday season (and year round) is to spend smart. I’ll share 10 ways you can be giving this holiday season without sacrificing your savings.

10 ways to spend smarter

I’ll share my top 10 ways I shop smarter, which are helpful for the holiday season and beyond.

  1. Make a list whenever you leave the house. Make a list, check it twice, don’t leave home without it!
  2. Use coupons and discounts, but only for things you need. Coupons are a great way to save money, but look for coupon codes or discounts for things that are on your list. You are NOT saving money spending on things that you don’t need.
  3. Create a “sale mail” email account. Set up an email account and sign up for emails from your favorite or most frequently shopped stores. Ignore it unless you are shopping, and check it before you make a purchase.
  4. Plan ahead for big purchases. Use this list as a guideline to find the best time of year to purchase most goods.
  5. Eat before you shop. Pack snacks or a meal if you will be out for a long time. Make sure to pack water as well. This not only saves money when food shopping, but also when you are doing other types of shopping as well!
  6. Choose quality over quantity. Use Consumer Reports, or other reviews to find a product that will last you longer than a cheap one.
  7. Institute a waiting period. Whether it’s a 30 day waiting period for larger purchases or a day long waiting period for small purchases, a waiting period is a great way to control your budget.
  8. Use your budget. Shop within your means. Simple, I know but difficult for some people (including me) to practice.
  9. Look online before you buy. Knowing the price of something online saves you time (no running from store to store), and you can guarantee you’ll know the cheapest price. Many stores offer price matching, so it’s a great incentive to spend 5-10 minutes searching the web.
  10. Don’t be afraid to bargain. Flexo had success bargaining, and saved $85 on a computer. It may seem difficult to do, but it’s worth trying, and could save you a ton of cash.

What’s your holiday budget this year? What ways do you save on holiday shopping?

To keep track of deals online for the holiday season, keep track of current Black Friday Deals at black-friday.net and find out about free shipping day, or find free shipping deals on freeshipping.org.

This is a guest article by Kelly Whalen, one of six finalists interested in being Consumerism Commentary’s staff writer.

Photo credit: stevendepolo

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News and Blogs: Wednesday, November 19, 2008

by Flexo on November 19, 2008

in Link Sharing

5 Money Mistakes in a Bad Economy. Here are the mistakes: continuing to use credit cards, withdrawing or taking a loan from your retirement funds, paying for college without loans, grants, or scholarships, neglecting to invest, and taking home-equity loans.

Bid to Ban Sale of Obama Tickets. Tickets to presidential inaugurations have always been free, but demand for the ability to attend Barack Obama’s ceremony early next year is so high that people are willing to pay tens of thousands of dollars for the opportunity to go. Congress is working to make the sale of these tickets illegal and to penalize those who attempt sell the tickets with a $100,000 fee or a year in jail. Those who live in the Washington, D.C. area stand to make more money by offering their homes and backyards to visitors in exchange for a rental fee.

Consumer Prices Fall Record 1% as Energy Plunges. Thanks to the sharp decline in gas prices, the overall CPI dropped the more in one month than it has since the data were recorded. That’s good news in the short term, resulting in lower expenses for consumers, but could be a problem for businesses when profit margins are already thin.

Last Minute Gift Ideas and Shopping Tips For Holiday Procrastinators. I find myself running around at the last minute as the holidays draw near. Here are some ideas for gifts for those people for whom you might not know how or what to buy. I would stay away from gift cards this year. There’s always a chance your favorite store could have a hard time this year. In the past, stores that enter bankruptcy have not always accepted gift cards.

Vanguard’s New Self-Employed 401(k) Plan – Roth Option Included. Here is a superficial review of this new offering from Vanguard. If I ever give up new contributions to my company 401(k) by leaving the corporate workforce, I’ll be taking advantage of this offering. This is worth more research when the time is right.

For the “News and Blogs” features, which I plan to run almost daily as long as I have additional articles to share, I select some of the most interesting posts from my RSS reader and from pfblogs.org. If you don’t believe you blog is included on my RSS reader, please let me know to so I can add it. Thanks!

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Twitter Poll: Will You Be Spending More or Less Than Last Year on Gifts?

by Flexo on November 7, 2008

in Consumer

Every so often, I present a question to Twitter to get a feel for opinions and ideas of Consumerism Commentary fans, readers, and friends. Yesterday, I asked whether you plan on spending more or less this holiday season than you did last year on gifts and other holiday expenses. With a troubling economy that doesn’t seem to be improving any time soon — just look at today’s unemployment numbers — the prevailing thought is that people are tightening their belts.

Since Twitter restricts responses to only a sentence or two, I also invited people to respond to the poll on the Consumerism Commentary Community (C3), a bulletin board that’s slowly getting off the ground.

Here are some responses.

  • dreamscostmoney: Wife and I decided to stop celebrating christmas altogether from now on. So, decidedly less.
  • conedude13: le$$!! See what i did there? clever, eh? :P
  • FinanceGirl: Spending less. Same value of items for everyone but me & husband, but getting stuff at better discounts & using RX transfer GCs.
  • bargainr: more! stimulate that economy!
  • rthornton: Plan to spend a little less. Driven more by desire to give smaller, more meaningful gifts than by state of economy
  • ToughMoneyLove: Spending less
  • nodebtplan: less, but not because of the economy. By choice – we’re giving gifts of experiences (doing stuff together, coming home for Christmas)
  • dgstinner: I plan on spending about the same for gifts during this year’s holiday season.
  • NickRac: Less – ONLY because I don’t have the girlfriend anymore!
  • brokegrad: More, because I’ve had a job this year as opposed to being a broke grad student like I was last year.
  • BurgBarbL: Probably about the same; I’ve managed to keep my overall spending in check, so feel OK about gifts
  • Anonymous: Probably less. Even though I’m making more money this year, it isn’t going as far, and I’m making a bigger effort to limit spending.

Many of the respondents plan on spending less this year, but not necessarily due to the economy. “Bargainr” (Jim from Blueprint for Financial Prosperity) is one of the few planning to spend more than last year, in what seems like an altrustic gesture to single-handedly save the retail economy.

On C3, That One Caveman says:

Much, much less, honestly. Our cash flow situation is pretty poor with all of our money going toward finishing our basement. I’ve allocated my blog’s income from the last month or so to cover at least a modest Christmas.

I consider those of us earning income from blogging, particularly as a “side stream,” pretty lucky in this economy. Without the income I earn from Consumerism Commentary and to a lesser extent a few other online projects, I would be in a very different financial situation.

Yana, a long-time Consumerism Commentary reader adds:

We’ll probably spend the same as last year, but we don’t do Christmas gift-giving or celebrations in general… I expect that due to the economy, there may be some especially great sales during or after the season. That could cause us to shop, if there is something we could use.

Stores are struggling in this economy, and some aren’t going to survive. Circuit City has already decided to close over 150 stores in the past week. I think there will be some great deals out there as stores work extra hard to get anyone to walk through the doors.

Follow me on Twitter to participate in future polls and join the Consumerism Commentary Community to discuss issues with other readers.

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8 Tips for a Unsuccessful Office Holiday Party

by Flexo on November 30, 2007

in Career and Work

If your office is like mine, you celebrate the holidays (but primarily Christmas) with a gift exchange of some sort as well as a party. I’ve found the office holiday experience to be hit or miss. Now, with the help of NBC’s The Office, here are some pointers for making December in the workplace awkward, upsetting, and unfortunate.

If you’re the boss, take these thoughts into account, and you’ll be remembered as the guy (or girl) who inadvertently created the human resource regulation banning further holiday parties throughout the company.

Michael gets a Christmas tree

1. Destroy company property. In a characteristic case of poor planning, Michael Scott erects a Christmas tree taller than the height of the ceiling. The team later decides to saw off the top of the tree. You don’t own objects around the office, the company does. Don’t worry about any damage you might cause.

Ryan’s iPod

2. Disobey gift exchange rules. When planning a “Secret Santa” gift exchange, it’s common to set spending limits such as $20 or $25 to ensure a little bit of equity among coworkers. As this is a “common” rule, it only applies to common coworkers. As the boss you are encouraged, even expected, to spend more than your underlings by a factor of 20. Michael presents his favorite employee, Ryan the intern, with an iPod, while others received handmade or inexpensive gifts from each other.

Michael’s oven mitt

3. Be ungrateful. Effort means nothing if your Secret Santa presents you with a crappy gift. Like Michael, don’t attempt to hide your disdain. In fact, use your disappointment as an excuse to change the type of gift exchange from Secret Santa to “Yankee Swap” (also known as “Nasty Christmas” or “white elephant”), in which everyone has a chance to steal presents from the others. Optionally, use “reverse psychology” to convince your coworkers to take the crappy gift from you.

Swapping the iPod

The good news is that you’ll feel special when everyone wants your $400 gift rather than the gifts worth $20 or less. Don’t worry about upsetting the Party Planning Committee.

Bonus

4. Brag about your bonus. You can afford purchasing the iPod because as the boss, you were the only one to receive a holiday bonus. Make sure you mention the amount of your bonus loud enough for everyone in the office to hear. After all, you deserve the extra $3,000, and they don’t.

Doing shots

5. Provide copious amounts of alcohol. Nothing can get a party going like vodka, and more so in an office environment. With alcohol as a social lubricant, there will always be stories to tell. Alcohol will also help you win back favor from your employees.

When I started my current position last spring, everyone was still talking about incidents from the previous year’s holiday party involving an excessively drunk coworker. That party was off-site, but as the boss, bringing alcohol against HR’s warnings will allow you to provide this kind of opportunity for someone else.

The jerk

6. Invite a jerk. Perhaps he’s your friend from your pre-managerial days, or maybe he’s just the actor who frequently plays jerks in movies and television shows. He’s always inappropriate, even before he is drunk. There’s no reason for his presence at the party, but as the boss, you can invite whomever you like.

Making out in the office

7. Designate the break room as the make-out area. We all spend so much of our waking lives with the same people, cooped up in the same office, so sexual relationships are healthy and should be encouraged. Make sure you are vigilant; as the boss, it is your responsibility to know who is hooking up with whom. This information will come in handy for blackmail later. Also, award bonus points for inter-species relationships, such as this human/elf combination…

Angela crying

… particularly if it makes another human jealous.

Nudity

8. Encourage promiscuity. As the boss, it is natural for your employees to be sexually attracted to you. Most of the time the people who are the most forward are not the ones you’d like to see without clothes. Nevertheless, it is important to take a photograph for posterity or for “art for the sake of art.”

Follow these guidelines, and you’ll be the producer of an unforgettable and unrepeatable holiday event.

Thanks to NBC/Universal and Universal Studios Home Entertainment for the images.

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Black Friday and Your Spending Habits

by Flexo on October 22, 2007

in Consumer

I truly despise the terms “Black Friday” and “Cyber Monday” and how the retail industry has created these days in an effort to rationalize outrageous spending on these particular days as if it should be accepted as an integral part of the holiday season. Cyber Monday did not exist until retailers created it, and as I expected years ago, the surge in online sales in the weekend and Monday following Thanksgiving has become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

That being said, I know I am spending more money on non-essential products this year. I’ve “upgraded” my living situation to “above bearable” and provided myself with some toys to keep me entertained — while still living below my means. Am I a reflection of a broader trend or are my spending habits going against the rest of the world this year?

I have some questions for readers, so please oblige me. Are you spending more this year than last? If so, why? Do you expect to find good deals on or around Black Friday, and will you spend more if you do? Will you wait until the last minute to hold out for more deals before the holidays?

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