Search results for holiday spending
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Posted
Oct 14 2008, 04:47 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
"Lazy Man" knows a grade-school kid named John who got a stuffed Garfield a couple years ago. Now John has 15 Garfield things in his bedroom. Lazy Man saw them and said, "I can't believe I didn't know you liked Garfield this much." John replied, "I don't." Someone saw that stuffed Garfield in John's room and assumed he loves all things Garfield, and it escalated from there. This little story at Lazy Man and Money explains how people accumulate huge collections of frog, owl or strawberry figurines, posters, pendants or whatever and they really don't want them. What's the worst gift you've been given? Lazy Man describes five categories of gifts he wishes he hadn't received. As Shadox said at Money and Such, "You know what? It is not only the thought that counts, people."
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Posted
Jul 15 2009, 12:29 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Lowering prices, upgrading or streamlining selection -- the nation's retailers are rolling out every trick to reverse slumping sales.
But is Christmas in July -- being promoted at the Sears and Kmart Web sites and in hundreds of Sears brick-and-mortar stores -- taking it to extremes? (We think so.)
Sure, smart shoppers know that it's wise to shop for bargains on gifts throughout the year, rather than loading up all of the holiday spending on one credit card bill. But advertising Christmas in July? "It looks more like desperation than inspiration," retail consultant Burt Flickinger III told Time magazine.
This latest adventure in retailing may be indicative of two trends:
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Posted
Dec 18 2008, 03:25 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Jennifer Derrick had the guts to bring this up with her extended family: Let's not exchange gifts this year. If her window had been open, we suspect she would have heard the collective sigh of relief. Jennifer is not a scrooge. But she did think about how meaningless -- and how stressful --the commercial aspect of the holiday had become to her. In an excellent post at Saving Advice called "The totally free (or nearly) Christmas," she explains how her thinking evolved:
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Posted
Nov 09 2007, 10:25 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
The turkey ads showed up in my mailbox the other day. This week I can get a gobbler for 39 to 79 cents a pound, or even for free if I were to spend $100 at one store. Compare that with the $4.99-a-pound cost for the "heritage" (exotic breed) turkeys featured in a recent article in Pacific Northwest, the Seattle Times Sunday magazine. Author Lynda V. Mapes described supermarket turkeys as having "cottony meat" and as being "so blanderized by industrial-style production it can be like eating sawdust with butter." The chef of a renowned regional restaurant orders the heirloom turkeys each year, Mapes wrote. "Not just any bird, after all, would do for his nine-course holiday dinner that goes for $189 per plate and up, including wine." Last year's menu included a choice of poached white meat on king bolete mushroom bread pudding, confit of leg on mashed delicata squash with shallot, or herbed crépinette on cabbage with quince. Then there were the side dishes, like cauliflower fenugreek soup
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Posted
Nov 26 2007, 09:37 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Yesterday I bought a pound of Starbucks coffee for just 99 cents. You, too, can get super-cheap brew, either for gift-giving or for your own frugal morning buzz. All you need is some empty inkjet print cartridges and proximity to a Staples or Office Max. Both businesses give $3 in store credit for each ink cartridge; certain brands are not accepted, so check each company's rules. The stores where I live let me use up to three credits, or $9 worth, per transaction. Both sell a number of holiday gift items: hoity-toity chocolates, fancy cookies, and specialty coffees, teas and flavored cocoas. Over the weekend I shopped for art supplies for a community gift program. At Staples, I noticed the coffee cost $9.99. I handed over three cartridges and a buck, and walked out with a penny in change and a pound of java. Had I been at Office Max, the brew would have been from another hometown brand, Seattle's Best Coffee . Jitter bells This is a frugalist's dream: nearly free gifts, or nearly free morning
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Posted
Nov 24 2008, 11:20 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
As part of his popular Save $1,000 in 30 Days Challenge, blogger Ramit Sethi is on to what might be his biggest and best money-saving idea. Tip No. 18 of the challenge is "No Christmas gifts this year."
"This year, Americans are planning to spend over $400 on Christmas gifts," he writes. "Instead of buying things we can't afford, here's a way to do something more meaningful."
For a lot of people who haven't taken steps to brace themselves for the coming economic reality, the first question should be: "Where can I sign up?"
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Posted
Dec 28 2008, 07:17 PM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Not all gift cards are welcomed by their recipients. Maybe you got a Nordstrom card although you're a thrift-store kind of gal. Maybe Uncle Fred gave you a Wal-Mart card, not knowing you're one of those folks who has problems with that merchandising giant's policies. Or maybe you, like MSN Money columnist Liz Pulliam Weston, simply don't like gift cards.
Remember that the giver meant well, and go ahead and write your thank-you note. After that, you're free to dispose of that gift card in any of the following ways.
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Posted
Oct 10 2008, 08:47 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Some experts predict that the current economic upheaval will result in anemic holiday shopping. That's certainly what I heard from readers of the Smart Spending message board.
Most of the 100 folks who responded to a holiday spending thread say they'll scale back, sometimes way back, and pay cash. A couple of them are skipping the holidays altogether.
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Posted
Aug 01 2008, 01:11 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Gas is expensive and food is going higher and higher. I'm not talking about today -- I'm flashing back to my teenage years. Times were tight between 1974 and 1976, when I ran the household for my father and younger brother. I remember how quickly the grocery money evaporated even though I made all our meals, desserts and snacks from scratch. Gasoline was not only costly but rationed during what was widely referred to as the "energy crisis."
People combined errands and stayed home a lot more. They cut back on nonessential foodstuffs, did without entertainment and new clothes, and generally tried to make their dollars go further. But this austerity didn't last. The age of conspicuous consumption cranked up in the 1980s, and cars seemed to get bigger each year. More than a few times I've said to myself, or to others, "Have we learned nothing from the '70s?"
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Posted
Feb 13 2008, 01:32 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Not ready for Valentine's Day and don't have a very large budget? Kyle at Rather Be Shopping offers "50 Valentine's ideas that won't break the bank." Some of his tips are sweet and romantic: Flirt with her throughout the day, or leave love messages on her phone. Some are more pedestrian: Dusting, vacuuming and cleaning the toilets, which Kyle says is "the one job she hates more than anything else." (We have to wonder, Kyle, why these are normally her jobs.) Our personal favorites are: "Wear your silk red boxers and dance for her," and "Give her a back massage certificate. You do the massage." We also recommend warming her towel in the dryer while she's taking a shower.
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