Black Friday Shoppers: This is the Least We Can Do.

In the past we’ve written about 10 things to do on Black Friday other than go shopping. 4 years ago REI started their #OptOutside campaign, and began closing its doors on Friday to make a pretty bold statement about using this day as an opportunity to choose being outdoors over our cultural push to just keep.buying.more.stuff.  Almost every year I do my best to celebrate Buy Nothing Day, which is easy when it means don’t go to a big box store (that technically opened on Thanksgiving…thanks corporate America). But this year I’ve been thinking about how I’m in the minority on this topic, and most of our society is just going to go ahead and buy.more.stuff. So if you insist on shopping on Black Friday, consider adopting one of these 3 standards to guide your spending and use your hard-earned dollars in a way that strengthens our community and prevents future waste.

• Buy Local: Yes there’s also Small Business Saturday (to support local businesses the weekend after Black Friday) but hey, you can’t hit every local store in one day and many have sales the whole weekend, so spread that love around! For instance, Pine Mountain Sports will donate half of all sales to Saving Grace, allowing your money to go even deeper into our community.
• Buy Energy Efficient: It seems that Black Friday is not just about holiday shopping for others, but about scoring big deals for yourself. So, if you find that you are using Black Friday as a day to stock up on appliances, use this opportunity to buy ones with an Energy Star rating. Check out this Energy Challenge (another Environmental Center program) article and resource on Energy Saving 101 with appliances.
• Buy Quality: The one thing that sales are good at (other than getting our dopamine all jacked up for getting a good deal on crap we don’t need) is allowing our money to go further by allowing us to buy a better product at an amount we can afford. This may be in the form of a gift, for your home, or for yourself. Think Quality Over Quantity. Do your research and read reviews so that you buy something that will not break within 6 months, is made to last for years, and is made with repairability and source materials in mind.

For most of us, our time is exchanged for money. So when you spend your money, you are essentially trading your time for that item.
Was it worth it?