Remember: It’s Not a Bargain If…

I’m sitting here trying to clear my inbox, which got rather stuffed over the past two days with all the bargains and deals to be had during Black Friday. I’m excited to share such low prices with you. But I’m also, frankly, feeling a little bit nervous.

Nervous that all the enthusiasm and exclamation points about Black Friday on frugal blogs, including mine, may motivate a reader to buy something they weren’t planning on… don’t really need… and maybe can’t even afford.

So, I just want to press pause for a moment and say, “It’s not a bargain if you don’t need it, weren’t planning to buy it, and can’t afford to pay cash for it!”

In that vein, I’d love to encourage you to go read a GREAT post from Jessica at Life as Mom, who shared her 5 Questions to Ask Yourself on Black Friday. These questions are spot on — I actually think they would be quite useful anytime you set out to the stores. Most especially when you feel that impulse-to-buy starting to overtake your motivation-to-save.

… and now back to our regularly scheduled program.

Comments

  1. Hallelukah! Well said. We just got back from Borders on 119th which is going out of business. We spent an inordinate amount of time there and in the end left without buying much. The books are 30-40% off, but that did not seem like so much of a bargain to “force” something I did not need. Especially since back at the ranch I have been trying to get rid of all the books we do not read any more or have outgrown.

    They are selling the furniture and displays. We scoured and scoured and tried to make a lot of it work. Then we stopped, regrouped, and told ourselves that getting something for cheap that either was too small for our intended purpose or too big that we could not move it into the house was definitely not a bargain. At the very end we did find bookshelves for $10/unit that will fit nicely in our basement school area.

    • I *heart* you, Dana! Glad you got a good deal on the bookcase. Funny how when you’ve been shopping like this for a while, 30-40% doesn’t even seem all that enticing. Ya did good!

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