“Mommy! I want THAT for my birthday!” “Me too! I want THAT one!”
Ever since my oldest child “graduated” from watching Treehouse exclusively, this refrain has echoed through the family room every day during TV time. It’s my kids, watching TV, asking for everything they see in commercials. And whenever we go out to run an errand – even just for a walk in the neighbourhood – it’s a constant stream of consumerism; “can’t we stop at Mac’s for a treat?”, “can we go to the video store for a movie?”, “buy me a toy while you’re out!”
I try my best to help my daughters intellectually navigate the stream of advertising they’re now faced with, from the ubiquitous TV ads to Point-Of-Sale treats at the post office, to the Scholastic book flyers that come home with remarkable frequency from school. My oldest daughter will recite, by rote, “they want you to buy it” when I ask her why companies pay TV stations to put ads on, but arming her with that knowledge doesn’t stop her endless wanting. My daughter, whose favourite things are dinosaurs, lizards and sharks; who often wears boys’ t-shirts because they feature dinosaurs, lizards and sharks, wants a Barbie lava lamp. Why? Because she saw it on TV.
I’ll admit I’m not immune to this myself. The proof came not too long ago when I overheard my girls telling their dad about the pictures they’d drawn that afternoon. “And this is me having a coffee at Starbucks”, pipes up the elder, echoed by “yah, we hab stawbucks” from her younger sister. So what’s a parent to do?
Sometimes, it’s tempting to just go with it. Let’s face it – brands provide us with some level of certainty about the products we spend our money on. I may pay more for a dress from Gymboree than one from Zellers, but I do know that it will still look cute on my second daughter two years and fifty washes later.
Lately, though, I’ve been brought up short in my consumerist complacency. I’ve been staying at home with my girls for nearly three years now, and it’s time to face the fact that if I want to keep doing so, our family is going to have to live more simply (which is a nice way to say “cheaply”). This way, we can have the money to spend on things we really need – retirement, education, etc. and still have a bit left over for the important things we want – skiing, iPod, travel, etc. To try and staunch my avid consumerism, I have made it my mission to reduce our grocery bill by at least $50 per week. I’m now rather proud of the fact that I keep a “price book”, tracking the price per 100g of every food item I buy from week to week. I carry my calculator with me when grocery shopping, so I can calculate whether it really is less expensive to buy 8 cases of yogurt at once instead of one box of 12 at a time. I clip (or download!) coupons. I’ve even unearthed the recipes my sisters and I used to call “welfare food” when my own mother was being frugal. Talk about Karma!
But it’s often an uphill battle. Call it greed, avarice or keeping up with the joneses, but I struggle to let go of my consumerism. I guess when I’m no longer jealous of my friend’s brand-name groceries (real Cheerios – I ask you!), I’ll know I’ve well and truly slain that inner beast. Until then, I guess I’ll have to keep repeating to myself the mantra I tell my daughters, “I don’t choose to spend our money on that right now”.
Kath is mom to two girls, an erstwhile elementary teacher and a regular contributor to urbanmoms.ca. She is also Calgary team member for urbanmoms.ca. If you’d like to comment on this or any other topic, or if you’d like to contribute, email kath@urbanmoms.ca