Look at your local big box, or worse-yet membership store, on any given weekend and you’ll find row after row of SUVs and people pushing bloated carts filled with food they may never eat and the week’s supply of paper products.
I don’t inherently have any issues with these stores, some good deals can be had, and a true prep does not eschew the value of a good deal. That said, we do take umbrage with companies using the implied value they bring as a blanket to all of the items they sell.
Just the other day, I saw the turkey sausage my wife and I eat for breakfast FINALLY available at Costco. I was so excited, we’ve said for years how great it would be to be able to get a bigger pack, as it would last longer - in theory cost less, and ultimately lead to less trash from an environmental standpoint. Deep down, we preps are all just a little bit of a tree-hugger, no?
Then I looked at the cost on a per sausage link basis, and it came out ever so slightly MORE than what we pay at the grocery store. I was appalled. This place I pay a membership fee to shop at is charging more than the grocery store…
At the risk of sounding whiny, I take umbrage with the social mores that have taken hold in the past 40 years or so, increasingly in the last 25 especially. Our society has carved a receipt sized hole into our personalities and continually attempt to fill it with purchase after purchase of the latest, hippest, fastest *insert item here*. This has given way to fast fashion (that is far from sustainably made), cheaply made furniture and accessories, and a surprising lack of hobbies. How many alcoholic seltzers one pounded over the weekend does not a hobby make.
Worse yet, this has combined with a guise that the only way to keep shareholders happy is by delivering record profits every year – assisted of course by grotesque compensation packages (that’s a topic for another email though). In this combination we see companies constantly iterating the smallest of advancements with new releases every year, as opposed to making something really well for years on end. I’m here to say, there’s nothing wrong with making 4 things, but making them truly, exceptionally well.
It’s up to us to take pride in the things we buy, and the story which those items tell. This isn’t in an effort for homogeneity, on the contrary in fact, I just feel one should buy shit that matters to you, not because you saw 40 instagram accounts that had the same piece. Let the story of you and your family build the world you live in, and the pieces you furnish with.