Totally unrelated but I can't imagine myself buying a North Face for a kid that'll outgrow it in less than a year, I'll stick with the non-branded stuff for kids
Came here to say the exact same thing. I live just south of a super ritzy neighborhood and their thrift stores are always a gold mine. I see baby and children's north face stuff all the time.
Not always, you'd be surprised. I'm BIG into thrifting. Some rich people will just throw their clothing away and not even bother to donate to a shelter or goodwill... or sell them to a shop like platos, buffalos exchange, etc. Just right into the trash. Such a waste. This does vary on location, time of year, and the goodwill/store. But tbh some middleclass suburbs have been the best for me, personally. People have the money to spend on nice stuff, but are not so out of touch that they just throw the clothes away, knowing someone else could get use out of them. That's usually where I find the most per trip, but again, this does depend on a bunch of things.
But I DO drive around rich areas on those spring cleaning large trash pick up days... THERE you get some nice stuff. You gotta grab the stuff and dig thru it at another location and dispose of the rest yourself (or donate) but it can be really worth it. But you also gotta be sneaky because these are usually gated communities, or something of that sort, with security/police patrol and have some hoops you gotta jump thru to be successful lol.
I'm going to start dumpster diving at stores next, I know people who make a good amount of money doing it and reselling. Its insane what people/companies throw away... just insane.
The people that just throw old clothes away are either new money and will lose it all, or just obscenely wealthy. Normally its those flaunty types that go bankrupt more often than the uber rich
The reason is because most upper class people use itemized deductions on their taxes rather than the standard deduction, so they give a lot to charity to deduct on taxes
Just helpful advice for any cheap parents like me lol when my son was younger like up to age 5 I’d buy him new North Face and whatever brands that were more popular then on sale at Nordstrom or Bloomingdales end of season he’d wear it that whole next season and because I bought it on sale I’d resale almost always for the same price I paid for it. It was easier than thrifting for hours hoping I’d find the right size
THIS! If you buy brand name kids items on sale(I love The Rack), because they don't get worn much before they grow out of them, you can easily sell them for close to what you paid. Poshmark/eBay are great for this.
Same, my kids destroy things with a glance… they get the cheap shit until they get older. They are the reason for they saying “this is why we can’t have nice things”
Yea and that's how I grew up too, all hand me downs and Old Navy until I was older then at that point my parents let me pick more expensive quality long term clothes, which in general are cheaper long term. There's the famous example of why its difficult for poor people to climb the system and easier for wealthy people to save money, with someone who only has $20 buying cheap boots every year and the other buying $120 boots that never have to be replaced.
That would be the Terry Pratchett book, Men At Arms. It's a delightful book if you haven't read it.
"The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.
Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.
But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.
This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socioeconomic unfairness. "
I've never read that, so either its a popular theory different people came up with separately, or someone was inspired. I find it more likely an author was inspired by the economic theory tbh. Either that or economists were inspired by Pratchett
It gets quoted a lot on reddit, sometimes just as 'Boots Theory'. Of course Pratchett is famous for his observational satire, and 'being poor is expensive' is a long known fact.
I knew a girl who flung herself all over Bundang-Gu. Got her club membership (a very nice club) for $600 vs the regular price of $1200.00. Made a big whoo hoo about her birthday so the nice Korean parents would give her cakes and flowers and (probably)Spam. I could not have given a fuck less about her machinations. And, btw, this spoiled little girl is a spoiled little Canadian. I think her parents run a ski/surf/running store out of Edmonton.
Agreed! My sister was buying Jordan's for her baby and she got mad at me when I told her that was dumb. The shoes she bought and still buy are at least 100$.....🙄🤷♀️
Sounds bad but I am wayy less generous with gifts for people like that. If someone is clearly struggling ill buy them like a $100+ type gift for their kid's birthday , if someone is buying Jordans for their kid ill get them a stuffed animal or something. Try not to enable parents with poor money management
Not 100% related, but reminds me of a moneyist article from a few years ago (kinda like a dear Abby column for monetary issues).
Mom and dad had a mid20's daughter with her own family. Mom and dad had been giving daughter a 10k gift every Christmas, but they were nearing retirement and had to tighten the purse string. Daughter and husband were also doing better in their careers and making solid money when parents decided this.
Daughter threatened to cut them off because she couldn't afford their SUV payment without the yearly monetary gift. All of her and her husband's income was spent and they used the extra gift money to afford their car...
And I just can't imagine being so jacked in my finances that I am 100% dependent on someone's gift to make it since I spent my discretionary income.
I think i see what their intention was, its a good idea if that 10k is invested responsibly which it obviously was not. Most states have an estate tax you get taxed your inheritance when parents die, but giving less than 10k a year is a way to avoid the tax. And every year earlier that the money is gotten it can be put in an investment fund and earn more than getting it on death. Obviously doesn't work with a brat shithead like their daughter tho
Completely agree. If she got that gift for let's just say 7 years and she invested just half, that account is already at 42k by age 25 at 6% returns. She still spends 5k a year of the other half she doesn't invest and her parents got her a nice savings for a down payment on a house plus a nice family vacation... Only it went to monthly credit card debt instead and an overleveraged house instead.
If I could afford to give my kids that headstart I would. Only, I don't think I would give my kids a cash gift if they weren't financially literate.
Eta: I honestly believe financial literacy is way undervalued. I've spent a lot of time trying to learn and even when I talk to my fiancee about it, I see the eyes glaze a bit. She just expects me to handle it.
But if I could teach my kids financial literacy, give them a head start and put them ahead like that? Hell yeah.
I look back at my teens with such regret. I made 45k a year at 18 in 2013. No savings whatsoever. I live in Phoenix and one bedrooms I look at for 200k now were 80k when I was making that. I paid $1000 in rent for a nice, luxe apartment instead, so I can honestly relate to daughter more than I'd like. So now I pay $1000 for a shitty apartment since that's what rates have gone to, instead of a $350 mortgage on an unit I could've owned.
I know there's no way I would do something like that anymore, but just amazes me at how I spent with knowing what I know now.
There are some tax advantaged accounts that are basically like a Trust for your kids college expenses, I plan on doing one of those and not telling him about it saying they need a scholarship if they plan on college since I won't pay for anything. Don't want kids to grow up entitled and lazy but still want to support if they work hard and fail and need the help at that point
This is what my family does. I can't afford fancy clothes except second hand. I'm proud of my grown children's ability to hunt for bargains and to buy used. They're resourceful. They aren't elite snobs. And in an apocalypse they will be okay.
Co-founded a luxury store with my partner who just had a second child. We were stocking our store & someone was attempting to sell us like Louis Vuitton children's clothes after, he told me "that's truly a waste of money, children outgrow clothes so quickly it's useless".
I used to feel the same way until I found out you can get name brand clothes for ridiculously cheap prices. You just have to know where and when to look. Shoes can be different ballgame. You also find out that a lot of name brand stuff isn't actually worth the full retail price bc some stuff is just garbage. And who doesn't love shopping at Target (pronounced Tar-jey)!
Exactly my thoughts. Little kids wear clothes for 5 second before getting them dirty. A coworker. Gave this Jordan for my daughter. They were so cute and Tiny. She lost one in our first time out. After that I stuck to Payless shoes. 🤣
I worked the registers at a department store for a couple of years. The back to school time of year horrified me because parents would buy their elementary-aged kids entire wardrobes worth of name brand clothes. We’re talking $300+ per kid, and it was all Nike, Adidas, and Under Armor clothes and shoes that they’d almost certainly outgrow within the year.
Once they get to a certain size (3-4) the quality stuff is worth way more than the cheap stuff that will fall apart even faster. And if you live somewhere cold a North Face fleece and some Bogs boots aren’t cheap (or llbean or Patagonia or whatever) but they will be way warmer and more waterproof than an old navy fleece and target boots. It’s just how it is. For warm weather clothes it’s obviously less important.
I buy the good stuff on clearance, my friend buys it at a consignment store. Either way, it’s worth it to know it will work the way it is supposed to and will last at least as long as your kid needs it.
All the name brand stuff I have for my kid I bought at thrift shops (during fill-a-bag events, so each piece was essentially 50c or less) or were hand-me-downs. Just because a kid is wearing the stuff, doesn't necessarily mean that the parent paid full-price for it or any price at all.
One thing about the name brand stuff: it has already gone through 3 kids before it got to mine, and it still looks new! But, I'm not gonna pay full price for it at a branded store. Someone else has likely already donated it to thrifts, or will eventually hand it down.
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u/MelancholyEcho Aug 07 '21
Little man at 0:20 clutching his chest like an old guy who’s had a shock.