Mar 23, 2008

Creative strategies for coping with rising costs: A few more thoughts

I wanted to add a couple of things to the posts so far in the Creative strategies for coping with rising costs series.

After reading this post over at The Consumerist, I wanted to add to my suggestions about using a price book that a price book isn't limited to groceries. (I think it was implied, but I wanted to make be explicit about this point.) My price book includes all toiletries we use, as well as paper goods such as zip top plastic bags, toilet paper (I've actually calculated the price per tissue), paper towels, and of course, diapers. In fact, a price book works for just about everything you buy regularly.

The other thing I wanted to add is that I came across a post about playing The Drugstore Game at CVS that made a point I have been learning myself: Buy things you don't need for the ECBs. As the writer says, doing so goes against the frugality that comes naturally to many of us, but it's how the game is played. (You can either save the items you bought for when you do need them, take the opportunity to try something new, give the items to a friend, or donate them to charity.)

3 comments:

Camille said...

Just wanted to support the "buy things you don't normally buy" scenario. I threw in a $8.99 lip gloss last week, which I never use, but my entire order (with the lip gloss, diapers and other items) only cost me $2.75 out of pocket. I received $20 in ECBs,part of which was the $8.99 from the lip gloss! It is completely counter-intuitive, but it works!

Brenna said...

There's always ebay, too! You could make even more money on those things you don't need!

Chief Family Officer said...

Thanks for the great ideas, Camille and Brenna!