I often hear, “You should never cheap out on a good office chair, shoes, underpants, backpack etc…” but what are some items that you would feel OK to cheap out on?
This can by anything from items such as: expensive clothing brands to general groceries.
I’m not sure I’d call this “cheaping out” but unless you can’t even afford that or you have a specific reason you need a more expensive one, you should buy mid-range ($200 - $400) phones. The early '10s are over and mid-range is more than adequate for the average phone user. Plus quite a few mid-ranges still have expandable storage and/or headphone jacks.
Left Samsung’s ever more expensive Note and Galaxy S lines for Motorola’s cheap ass G series like three or four years ago and haven’t looked back. I buy a new phone once a year on my tax return for like $200-250. I gift my previous device to my younger cousins, nieces, nephews, and mother. Keeps everyone from having to pay off devices on their phone plans and the phones are still running rather well year over year. The only hold out, claiming to “need” the latest and greatest, is my older sister who insists she needs the new iPhone every two years.
Cell phone. A $200 android is extremely fast these days
Depends. That’s about what I paid for my previous phone second hand and it lasted me 7 years and I loved it to bits. But I was pretty broke and only could afford that. New phone, I decided to buy a brand new fairphone, because i think that the moment I get enough disposable income, I have a moral responsibility to use it in ways that encourage more ethical practices, for all the people who can’t. Doing that is bloody expensive, but if it somehow helps make this dystopian hellscape a little more bearable, I’ll invest.
Indeed. And that’s a great point, I would love a fairphone (or idealy a true linux handheld) for my next mobile device.
The key to my post is that purchasing $1500 sansungs and ios devices is ludicrous in this market, unless you are developing on the cutting edge or are a luxury tech enthusiast
Fashion clothes, if you’re getting something that you’ll wear for one summer and then never again then Primark is fine.
Salt, sugar, most herbs and spices, it’s all the same stuff regardless of brands
Some snacks, often crisps are the same Aldi own brand as Walkers or whatever, or they’re perfectly good. Yes we all want some kettle chips sometimes but it’s all good, same for jelly sweets, a lot of chocolate, etc.
Hobbies for beginners, if you want to take up knitting then start with a cheap kit and upgrade as you get more serious.
Fashion clothes
Better yet: buy long-lasting stuff that is ethically produced. Primark is notoriously bad in this regard — but most fast fashion stores are.
It depends how much you plan to use it. If you’re going to wear something a few times then a long lasting piece of clothing is wasteful.
Hobbies for beginners, if you want to take up knitting then start with a cheap kit and upgrade as you get more serious.
This is the big one. If you’re starting a new hobby, it’s easy to fall into the trap of buying loads of expensive kit because it’s shiny and new. Buy the cheaper versions first and learn what you actually need. If you need to upgrade then, at least you know what to buy.
Obviously this doesn’t apply to safety kit 👍
I find the opposite with some hobbies. If you buy a cheap acoustic guitar it’s going to be horrible to play and will probably sound crap. That might discourage you from continuing. More expensive guitars have a much better resale value too, so you’d probably be out of pocket for less if you buy a nice one and sell it again than if you bought a crap one and no one else wanted to buy it.
I kinda agree. Knitting is the go-to for this advice, which makes sense. It gets crazy expensive crazy fast. But starting out with shitty yarn and needles makes the whole thing miserable. Same with a lot of other crafting and baking. Using low quality materials results in an unsatisfying product, and low quality tools make for an unsatisfying learning process.
I generally recommend letting yourself buy something nice-but-not-luxury that you’re excited about, but keeping those initial investments really limited in scope. Buy one nice(ish) pair of needles and just enough nice(ish) yarn to make a specific project. You don’t want to go broke for something you end up hating, but you do want to be able to know whether you hate the actual hobby or you just hate doing that hobby badly.
Smartphones. Most people don’t need to buy the latest and greatest iPhone every year.
Yes and no. For apple you can use their phones for quite a long time securely. For Android that is a very different story. As far as I know only Google with their new pixel phones and Samsung have offered more than 2 years of updates. After that time your phone becomes a security risk. So make sure your devices receives updates or can be used with a custom ROM (though that can be insecure as well).
What a load of crap. My phone is 5 years old and the only security risk is me blindly installing questionable APKs off the Internet or clicking pop-up ads or something. It’s not like I’m walking around with a time bomb or anything when all I do is browse a few apps and text and call.
Also the new pixel 8 supposedly is supposed to come with 7 years of updates. It’s entirely possible Google abandons that plan though, given their track record.
It’s 2 years of FEATURE updates, usually longer for security.
Sometimes. It depends on the manufacturer. Some do more some don’t promise anything. You have to know what you have. Also the support time starts usually at the start of sale not at the time of purchase. That means if you buy a new phone that was released a year ago on clearance or something you might have only half the time.
Medicine: the branded stuff is normally exactly the same but many times the price.
When I go to the pharmacy I always ask for the cheapest generic drug product of Ibuprofen or whatever I need, it’s a couple of euroes cheaper.
I switched to the store brand breakfast cereals. Never going back to Kellogg’s again. The store brand ones near me are so good. And they’re made with better ingredients like cane sugar over corn syrup and shit.
I agree, even the ingredients part, except referring to color/flavor additives.
But cane sugar is an utter “word trick” that means absolute nothing. It is just as processed, and is exactly as good for you, as corn syrup. It’s an example of “health theater” that companies do with labeling.
All your basic staples: salt, flour, oil, sugar, pasta, pasta, milk, eggs etc. There’s literally nothing to do better or worse, so for god’s sake don’t pay for the label. Fancy olive oil is nicer, and fancy butter for actually putting on bread is nice too - but for cooking, cheap the hell out.
Get your spices from an Indian / Asian / etc grocer - you can get a huge bag for the price of a tiny supermarket jar, and because they have so much turnover, they’ll be plenty fresh.
Store-brand laundry detergent and dishwasher tablets work just fine for me (and dear god you can save a lot on those).
All your basic staples: salt, flour, oil, sugar, pasta, pasta, milk, eggs
It depends. Cheap salt is just fine. And flour, unless you’re into baking. But some things can make a difference and you don’t necessarily have to pay a lot more for it.
Pasta, for example. Bronze cut pasta absorbs sauce a lot better than “normal” pasta. It looks dull, rough, and pale as opposed to shiny and smooth. It usually only costs a buck or two more. I find it’s a big step up taste and texture-wise.
Or butter. The ones without natural flavor taste better. Sometimes it’s the store brand that doesn’t have added flavor.
And eggs. Orange yolks are way better than the pale yellow ones. But those you do have to shell out for.
Wait wait wait. Your butter has flavouring added? Like, I realise I’m spoiled here in Ireland, but fuck mei can’t even picture what that might be
That was my exact reaction! But butter is literally nothing but churned cream and possibly salt added? If there’s anything else added, such as water or any kinds of oils, it’s no longer butter. I get more scared every time I learn something new about US food culture…
