I’m a Sucker for the Red Stickers
Walking through Target the other night was certainly interesting. For one; I haven’t been in a Target store for probably over a year. Secondly, I have never been so enticed to the “deals” as I was last night! I don’t know what the deal was, but I was having a hard time focusing on the real reason we were in the store: to look for a birthday present for my niece.
As I walked the aisles, I couldn’t help but notice many items that I desperately needed, conveniently placed on all the end caps with shiny red stickers proclaiming “75% off!”. I believed it was divine intervention. Surely I needed some of these things. After all, they were 75% off. Why not get them when they are a good deal? I could use this new plastic cover with rhinestones for my Motorola Razr. It was only $3. Great deal! Into the basket it went. I saw Clorox Green Works cleaners for 50% off. As I made a bee line over to the display, Mr. Money touched my shoulder and asked why I was headed over there.
“Because it’s a good deal! Look at how much money we’ll be saving! It’s normally $4, and it’s now only $2.” I replied.
He looked at me like I was crazy, and said:
“But you make all of our cleaning products, so why would you need those?”
I stopped, dead in my tracks and realized how stupid I probably came across to him. He was right. Why would I buy cleaning products that we don’t use just because they are on sale? It was at that point I looked in our basket, realized I had thrown things in there I didn’t need, reached down, removed the items and put them back on the shelf. I was almost embarrassed I put that rhinestone cover in my basket. I realize now that this is why I hate going in stores. I’m not immune to the sales, and I’m certainly not exempt from consumerism. I’m just glad that I didn’t walk out of there with a bunch of “sale” items. That would have been money thrown down the drain. Lessons learned, right?
How do you stop yourself from purchasing things you really don’t need?
I try to stay out of the stores and shop with a list. No wandering around, just get whats on the list and be done with it.
I went to the store yesterday to buy one thing, but I had an hour to kill so I wandered around. I’m not going to mention how much I spent.
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Really the only guaranteed way for me to avoid unnecessary purchases is to stay away from stores to begin with. I’ll always be a sucker for a deal and Mr M is the worst. Green works for $2 huh, I love that stuff.
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I really hate shopping in regular stores and so I don’t find it difficult to ignore sales. I go clothes shopping maybe four times a year and really try to stick to a list of what I need. My worst enemy is online shopping. I could shop for kitchen gadgets on Amazon all day! I try to force myself to think about the purchase for a few days and talk it over with my partner so I don’t buy anything on impulse.
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Ashley- I hear ya! I am so bad sometimes! I need to make a list and then stick just to that.
Miss M- I know now while I’ll be staying away from the stores!
Fit Wallet- I am a bad online shopper too. I browse and find all this things I “need” and then get suckered into, well it’s only $10… or whatever.
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It’s hard to resist these sales, and impulse buying is something that marketers love. They must hate Mr Money!
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Rosie- Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment! Mr. Money is not perfect either, but he is MUCH better than I am about resisting temptation!
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