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Think Outside The Subscription Box

By Frugaling 22 Comments

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Think Outside The Subscription Box

“Show someone you care with a random box of stuff this holiday season.”
— CNNMoney

There’s Graze, Birchbox, Barkbox, Brobox, Dollar Shave Club, Trunk Club, Blue Apron, and now, there’s Minimalism & Co.’s new minimalist themed subscription box. Each box has their own flavors, qualities, and featured products. Some use corporate partnerships to market products through these boxes, while others are hand-selected items by the box creator. These subscriptions can include makeup, food, and much more.

The subscription model is usually set at one box per month, but this varies between companies. The prices range from $25 to $100s each month. If you’re using Blue Apron — a meal preparation service — you’ll likely sign up for more regular deliveries. Although, Minimalism & Co. sends their box once every quarter (3 months). Regardless, once you sign up, you’ll be getting regular deliveries of unexpected “gifts.” It’s like getting a surprise present each month!

However, there’s another way of looking at this subscription craze. To mindlessly subscribe and receive trinkets, makeup, and/or men’s grooming products seems to be the epitome of conspicuous consumption. It’s unclear who might need these products; I mean, truly need a product received through a subscription box.

Initial subscriptions are often discounted to make the first box free or inexpensive. Subscription services know that once they have someone on the trial, they’re more likely to continue using their product and/or try it again at a later date. And even if you were done with the service, you might not want to go through the terrible phone trees and/or automatic email exchanges to get your cancellation confirmed. All the while, you’re spending money, adding clutter, and struggling to cancel the onslaught.

Subscription boxes have made minimalism, orderliness, and frugality harder. Fortunately, there’s an alternative to this madness. Today, I want to introduce a solution to effortless consumption. In fact, I’ve come up with a clever name for the subscription, too: “ByeBox.”

Our worries will be solved. It starts with a nearly empty box. When you subscribe to ByeBox, you receive nothing but a cardboard box and a piece of paper. Isn’t that revolutionary and minimal!? And there’s no need to be careful when carrying the box into your house, as there’s nothing to break. Once you’ve opened up the box to see no goodies, makeup, razors, grooming products, or exotic foods from Chile, you can prepare for a far more intentional decision.

Written on the 8.5 by 11-inch paper is a simple request: “Pick something from your house that you once wanted/desired, but no longer find enjoyment or need. Place it in box and ship it back to ByeBox for another empty box!” It’s just that simple!

We are faced with countless opportunities to spend and collect every day. Surprisingly, many have embraced subscription boxes and taken to spending outsized proportions on tchotchkes that provide little value to our lives. My idea — ByeBox — might be a joke, but wouldn’t this make more sense to those working to live a minimal and frugal lifestyle? The harder decision always seems to be fighting against the mode of consumption — to find ways to minimize by going without and throwing out.

Filed Under: Minimalism, Save Money Tagged With: ByeBox, Conspicuous, Consume, Consumer, Consumption, frugality, minimal, Minimalism, subscribe, subscription box

I Visited The Mall Of America And Only Bought A Coffee

By Frugaling 16 Comments

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Mall of America Consumption Junction
Photo: Cliff/flickr

About a month ago I decided to tag along with a good friend of mine to Minneapolis, Minnesota. Despite traveling through much of America, I’d never been to the land o’ lakes. It was time, and the price was right: free. My friend was going up there anyways and the passenger seat was empty.

I hemmed and hawed, thinking about my budget. In recent months I’ve become a bit mad about saving money. Heck, I’ve come undone by a mere $4 book that I avoided! But that militancy towards my budget has largely paid off. My savings has quickly ballooned.

Nonetheless, I couldn’t pass up this opportunity to join in the fun and meet some new people. The drive, about five hours from Iowa City, Iowa to Minneapolis, Minnesota, is through some of the more fertile land in America. This is truly where our food comes from. Always a suburb or city-boy at heart, I quickly displayed my naivete when I incorrectly labeled corn stalks as, “ahhh, look at that, they’re growing soybeans!” Yeah, I was out of my element.

When we finally closed in on the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, I was pumped to be in this new city. Whenever I’m out of my home cities, I feel a powerful urge to be both anxious and excited — all at once. That rush was endless, as around every corner there was something new and different about the Twin Cities. I loved it!

Along the way, my friend said, “Is there anything you want to do in particular? Is there anything you really want to see?” With a wistful, targetless attitude, I suggested that I was open to anything, but had no idea where to go next. That’s when he said, “How about we check out the Mall of America?”

Instantly, this rush of excitement filled me. Think about all of the numerous shops and stores and restaurants! The Mall of America was founded in 1992 and has about 7,900,000 square feet of space, which is spread out between a shocking number of floors and land. Walking into this place, it’s like an amusement park; in fact, there’s one built-in to the mall!

I soon turned to my friend and said the most obvious thing I could think of, “This place is just made for people to consume and buy more stuff.” Clouded and in shock, I decided to walk into a coffee shop and imbibe a small one. The two of us, propped onto some cushy couches and people watched.

There were women barely wearing anything — bursting out of their skintight clothing. There were families battling for the next choice in destination. There were young people and old.

Finally, we decided it was time to go. As we made our departure, a family asked nearby shoppers to take a picture of them. They had one child in their stroller, who was saddled with bags upon bags of new clothing. In the middle of taking another picture — curiously positioned in front of an elevator — the child fell backwards, as the weight of the bags outweighed the young one.

Mall of America Coffee ConsumptionI turned to my friend and couldn’t help laughing aloud. Here we were in consumption central, and someone had loaded this stroller so full of products that the child was no longer safe. Somehow it spoke to me. Why are we buying like this when we know that the environment is suffering and the total U.S. consumer debt stands at a whopping $11.4 trillion? The family, curiously, just propped the kid back up in the stroller and resumed the photos — bags still weighing down the stroller. They certainly put new meaning to the cliche, “Shop till you drop.”

Now, as Minneapolis develops a light rail system to and from the airport and city, those on an airport layover needn’t see the metropolis. Instead, you can just hop on the public transportation directly to the Mall and buy endlessly. You don’t even need to see the local culture!

Like surviving a crazy amusement ride, I feel like I need a t-shirt that says, “I went to the Mall of America and all I bought was a coffee.”

Filed Under: Save Money Tagged With: Coffee, Consume, Consumption, Mall of America, Malls, Shopping, Travel

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