In mid-January 2018, a friend challenged me: buy nothing new in 2018... Surprise and resistance past, I accepted to take it up.
As I'm not necessarily inclined towards extremes, I saw it more as an opportunity to
1) reduce my consumption and 2) for purchases that are harder to "compress",
observe my needs and the gaps in second-hand alternatives.
Bicycleparts= $1410
Essentially: electric bike battery ($1000), disc brakes, and other bike parts.
Carparts= $850
Includingtires ($800) and windshield wipers. Knowing that used tires don't last as long...
Kitchen / householditems=$212
Essentially: hand mixer and earthen eurs pots.... Curiously, these 2 items were absent from kijiji for several months.
Outdooritems= $180
Mosquitonet and hammock. The euphoria of going on vacation...
Variousgifts= $165
Includesa cushion made by a small local designer, priced at $95. Otherwise, these were a few favorites, or very specific items, intended to fill a specific need... One of the greatest difficulties in shopping for second-hand objects is abandoning the image you've created of a product...
Electronics = $130
Includesa computer battery, to extend the life of it, and headphones, received as a gift. Again, I'd checked with the person who gifted it to me to see if there were any second-hand options, and those found on kijiji didn't match.
Clothing= $83
Theeasiest category to pare down in my opinion, especially with thrift stores and organized "switches" between friends. Just a little slip-up before the holidays, with the purchase of a sweater, in a store in Europe....
Mobility is unequivocally the biggest item of expenditure: almost 3/4 of total purchases! The use of electric bicycles is intended to reduce car use... A statistic recently published in a French newspaper states that the radius of bicycle trips is 3.5 km, compared with 7 km for electric bikes...
Some of the items listed above may fall into the category of "consumables", meaning they need to be replaced periodically, such as bicycle parts or computer batteries...
On the other hand, outdoor items remain a major expense, year after year. La Cordée organizes a Troc event twice a year...
Good resolution for 2019: put these events on my calendar!
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