I've purchased something like 7 copies of my favorite earbuds (https://snext-final.com/en/products/detail/E2000C.html) because I'm afraid that someday Final will go out of business/stop manufacturing them, and my existing pairs will break. It's nice to have one copy at home, one in my backpack, and a few others to randomly gift people on their birthdays.
I'm a classic underbuyer. I don't have faith in the next week let alone the next year. It's a strange way anxiety manifests and then increases anxiety. I'm killing it over here. :)
I've found my tribe. I always advise people to buy that perfect pair of excellent fitting shoes in as many multiples as possible. Ditto shirts etc in adaptable colors, styles. Pens, cheater glasses, chapstick, soil thermometers and any other perennial thing that the budget and storage space will permit.
My big problem with buying large numbers of things is: storage. You mentioned this, but it's really the killer. Your point is well-taken, though. There happens to be one breakfast cereal I've eaten all my life, and while it's still sold in stores, the price is ridiculous. So if I see a sale, I buy a whole bunch of it, and keep the extras in the garage.
Do I want to open the kitchen cabinet and see 23 cans of beans? No I don't. Do I want to look in the closet and see 10 identical shirts?
I own multiple copies of everything - tip for buying multiple copies of clothing, just start with one and give it a few weeks to make sure that there's not a hidden itchy tag/weird fit that only shows up when you're moving around/etc that you actually don't like, and then go back and buy more. If it's a more expensive item you can frequently buy several duplicates used now that you know that it fits
There is another aspect you have left out. Marketing has a term 'Harbinger of Doom' or 'Harbinger of Failure'. see: https://arstechnica.com/science/2015/12/certain-customers-spell-doom-for-new-products/ I am one of them. And chances are, _you are too_. 'Willing to be weird' is strongly co-related with being one. So, you go out and see something, think 'that looks cool' and decide to buy one. You figure you will test it for six months, and if you are still delighted with the item you will get some more. Six months go by. You are even happier than you expected to be. And the item has been discontinued by the manufacturer.
I will buy if I have money. Whether I need it in the future or not, or other things are not important. As someone living in Turkey, I know that if I don't buy in bulk today, I will spend more money tomorrow and be able to buy fewer. Of course, if I have a job that pays me tomorrow.
Ha, writing (or probably just tweeting) about the small things subcase has crossed my mind before (though I don't do most of the other things here or even abide by this all the time).
Once you get "cheap material waste is probably fine"-pilled (and assuming you have a double digit number of dollars to spend), you can just never run out of lots of things (random example: 1000 trash bags https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07DY4GLMW)
OTOH there's a reason people pay a premium for optionality/small amounts - a 170 pack of CVS brand nicotine gum is sitting on a table near me, about half empty. Maybe I'll eventually use it all, but P<50%
One of the best small decisions I made in college was buying a second laptop charger. One for the backpack, one for home. For 15 dollars, I never 'left my charger at home' and all the related cortisol and crises, I saved 30 seconds x 5 days a week x 50 weeks a year x 4 years (8+ hours of my life), countless awkward bending down from a chair while sitting trying to find the wall plug blindly, and every time my desk was kept clean and snug with its 'permanent' charger in place and intentionally snaked and coiled to lay naturally right where my laptop charging port was. Everyone though it was a waste of money to buy an extra cable, but man did it pay divedends.
Also related to duplicates but in a different way, I once bought 2 24 packs of white cheddar Annie's Mac and cheese that was on double sale and roughly 75 percent off. It lasted a year, but didnt really change my enjoyment of it for a much cheaper cost.
I regularly have multiple pairs of my favorite pants in my closet still in the packaging. I'll keep 3-5 in rotation with a few more in reserve. Same with socks, underwear, and a t-shirts. All the same brand/style in a few basic colors. I suspect this is easier with mens fashion as we have the luxury of wearing the same thing over and over without any social pressure not to do that.
Our first Christmas together I got my now wife an industrial size package of disposable earplugs, which she wears to sleep. 7 years later and she is still working through the box!
Came to this article hoping to learn some acceptable weirdness/convenience tradeoffs, was disappointed to find out I'm apparently *already* weird and do basically all of this. :P
In particular the "have redundant copies" is something I've really taken to heart as I've come to grips with my tendency to constantly lose things. CGP Grey was who really convinced me on this point, as he puts it on his podcast, "two is one and one is none".
Quantity of money and storage space are the HUGE factors in this strategy-philosophy, but another barrier I've experienced is the stores themselves. If an item is available at a great sale price, there is almost always a sticker reading: "Limit of four per customer". I'll buy those four items, but I guess my hoarding-fu is weak. I can't be bothered to strategize how to return to the store later wearing a false moustache or something to buy four more.
Your pizza example reminds me of my sister and Chinese food. When ordering dishes for the table, someone always has their mother (figuratively or literally) whispering their ear to "eat some veggies". One such restaurant visit, sis snapped. "NOBODY ever wants or eats the veggies! We're out for a fun treat! Screw the veggies! More ginger beef!"
I buy a big batch of the cheapest decent looking glasses from Zenni, and just like you said I'll probalistically find a "lost" pair somewhere when I happen to need them.
Also, starting with COVID we got in the habit of a "store what you eat, eat what you store" food strategy. So all the staples are bought in multi-month supplies. So we have emergency food if everything goes to hell, less shopping, and it's cheaper.
I've purchased something like 7 copies of my favorite earbuds (https://snext-final.com/en/products/detail/E2000C.html) because I'm afraid that someday Final will go out of business/stop manufacturing them, and my existing pairs will break. It's nice to have one copy at home, one in my backpack, and a few others to randomly gift people on their birthdays.
The Redundancy-Efficiency Manifesto.
I'm a classic underbuyer. I don't have faith in the next week let alone the next year. It's a strange way anxiety manifests and then increases anxiety. I'm killing it over here. :)
I've found my tribe. I always advise people to buy that perfect pair of excellent fitting shoes in as many multiples as possible. Ditto shirts etc in adaptable colors, styles. Pens, cheater glasses, chapstick, soil thermometers and any other perennial thing that the budget and storage space will permit.
My big problem with buying large numbers of things is: storage. You mentioned this, but it's really the killer. Your point is well-taken, though. There happens to be one breakfast cereal I've eaten all my life, and while it's still sold in stores, the price is ridiculous. So if I see a sale, I buy a whole bunch of it, and keep the extras in the garage.
Do I want to open the kitchen cabinet and see 23 cans of beans? No I don't. Do I want to look in the closet and see 10 identical shirts?
I own multiple copies of everything - tip for buying multiple copies of clothing, just start with one and give it a few weeks to make sure that there's not a hidden itchy tag/weird fit that only shows up when you're moving around/etc that you actually don't like, and then go back and buy more. If it's a more expensive item you can frequently buy several duplicates used now that you know that it fits
There is another aspect you have left out. Marketing has a term 'Harbinger of Doom' or 'Harbinger of Failure'. see: https://arstechnica.com/science/2015/12/certain-customers-spell-doom-for-new-products/ I am one of them. And chances are, _you are too_. 'Willing to be weird' is strongly co-related with being one. So, you go out and see something, think 'that looks cool' and decide to buy one. You figure you will test it for six months, and if you are still delighted with the item you will get some more. Six months go by. You are even happier than you expected to be. And the item has been discontinued by the manufacturer.
As I note here https://www.mattball.org/2022/03/give-yourself-raise.html Financial Guru Andrew Tobias has long recommended this!
I will buy if I have money. Whether I need it in the future or not, or other things are not important. As someone living in Turkey, I know that if I don't buy in bulk today, I will spend more money tomorrow and be able to buy fewer. Of course, if I have a job that pays me tomorrow.
Ha, writing (or probably just tweeting) about the small things subcase has crossed my mind before (though I don't do most of the other things here or even abide by this all the time).
Once you get "cheap material waste is probably fine"-pilled (and assuming you have a double digit number of dollars to spend), you can just never run out of lots of things (random example: 1000 trash bags https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07DY4GLMW)
OTOH there's a reason people pay a premium for optionality/small amounts - a 170 pack of CVS brand nicotine gum is sitting on a table near me, about half empty. Maybe I'll eventually use it all, but P<50%
One of the best small decisions I made in college was buying a second laptop charger. One for the backpack, one for home. For 15 dollars, I never 'left my charger at home' and all the related cortisol and crises, I saved 30 seconds x 5 days a week x 50 weeks a year x 4 years (8+ hours of my life), countless awkward bending down from a chair while sitting trying to find the wall plug blindly, and every time my desk was kept clean and snug with its 'permanent' charger in place and intentionally snaked and coiled to lay naturally right where my laptop charging port was. Everyone though it was a waste of money to buy an extra cable, but man did it pay divedends.
Also related to duplicates but in a different way, I once bought 2 24 packs of white cheddar Annie's Mac and cheese that was on double sale and roughly 75 percent off. It lasted a year, but didnt really change my enjoyment of it for a much cheaper cost.
Totally agree!
I regularly have multiple pairs of my favorite pants in my closet still in the packaging. I'll keep 3-5 in rotation with a few more in reserve. Same with socks, underwear, and a t-shirts. All the same brand/style in a few basic colors. I suspect this is easier with mens fashion as we have the luxury of wearing the same thing over and over without any social pressure not to do that.
Our first Christmas together I got my now wife an industrial size package of disposable earplugs, which she wears to sleep. 7 years later and she is still working through the box!
Came to this article hoping to learn some acceptable weirdness/convenience tradeoffs, was disappointed to find out I'm apparently *already* weird and do basically all of this. :P
In particular the "have redundant copies" is something I've really taken to heart as I've come to grips with my tendency to constantly lose things. CGP Grey was who really convinced me on this point, as he puts it on his podcast, "two is one and one is none".
Quantity of money and storage space are the HUGE factors in this strategy-philosophy, but another barrier I've experienced is the stores themselves. If an item is available at a great sale price, there is almost always a sticker reading: "Limit of four per customer". I'll buy those four items, but I guess my hoarding-fu is weak. I can't be bothered to strategize how to return to the store later wearing a false moustache or something to buy four more.
Your pizza example reminds me of my sister and Chinese food. When ordering dishes for the table, someone always has their mother (figuratively or literally) whispering their ear to "eat some veggies". One such restaurant visit, sis snapped. "NOBODY ever wants or eats the veggies! We're out for a fun treat! Screw the veggies! More ginger beef!"
I buy a big batch of the cheapest decent looking glasses from Zenni, and just like you said I'll probalistically find a "lost" pair somewhere when I happen to need them.
Also, starting with COVID we got in the habit of a "store what you eat, eat what you store" food strategy. So all the staples are bought in multi-month supplies. So we have emergency food if everything goes to hell, less shopping, and it's cheaper.