Last week’s blog [0] was all about how hard it was for me to buy a much-needed brand new shovel, because we should try to consume less due to all our stuff [1] causing a lot of problems in the world. Thinking about every purchase and balancing need and want is a good way to curtail unnecessary stuff, and especially those compulsive purchases that seem so important at the time, but end up taking up shelf and life space. But it also makes me feel somewhat deprived.

This week I’m talking about the joys of consuming… for a cause. Whee! 

Since I’ve been on both a non-consumer binge and a spending freeze, I haven’t spent much time in my favorite local stores, just window-shopping, sniffing soaps, glancing at potential future family gifts. But Georgia has been in a class that walks me right into the heart of our fabulous urban hub. And I’ve been enjoying just stopping in stores I used to frequent, before the era of deprivation hit. But I haven’t felt that deprived. In fact, I felt enlightened. In the awesome Powell’s Books for Cooks [2] I saw a recycled plastic outdoor rug that I had seen in the World Market circular (circulars having taken the place of window-shopping these days). A CFL went off in my brain. If I had decided the rug passed the test of want vs. need (and it hasn’t), and if our budget eased up (it’s not likely for while), I would have driven to World Market instead of buying the rug at my locally owned, keystone store in my own neighborhood.

I decided that window-shopping, and wanting stuff, even if it’s stuff I’ll never buy, isn’t such a bad thing. I don’t need to completely shut that out. It keeps me connected to my neighborhood and makes me remember that when I am going to buy something, it needs to be from one of these stores, especially during this difficult economic time. And then, as serendipity would have it, I came across the 3/50 Project. 

The 3/50 Project’s mission is to keep locally owned brick-and-mortar businesses in business. In a world of Target, Wal-Mart and Home Depot, and even Trader Joe’s (which I frequent), doing business outside of the Big Box is a courageous thing, and small businesses are struggling, especially now. The 3/50 Project asks for a simple pledge:

3 – Choose three independent, locally owned businesses that you would miss is they disappeared.

50 – Spend $50 a month among the three. 

And now here’s a stunning statistic I am trusting from the web site: “For every $100 spent in locally owned independent stores, $68 returns to the community through taxes, payroll, and other expenditures. If you spend that in a national chain, only $43 stays here. Spend it online, and nothing comes home.”

There’s no way I can commit to $50 a month (sorry Reading Frenzy [3]), but I’m tossing the circulars into the recycling bin and doing my wish list shopping locally. Someday the spending freeze will thaw, and that recycled plastic rug will look really cute under my locally crafted, recycled wood porch swing!