Recession shopping

cookiemonster wrote:

evercloserunion wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

evercloserunion wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

evercloserunion wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

Cafe Java in and around the City Centre do soup, a sandwich and a softdrink/coffee for €10.

How much are those things individually? Because that strikes me as atrocious value.

Might be cheaper if it was made by endentured 5 year olds working 18 hour days.

They're lucky to have the job

And "socialists" to watch their backs.

If 5 year olds are working then either there are no socialists around or the socialists aren't doing such a good job. Personally I don't know any working 5 year olds. Do you?

Out of sight, out of mind, eah?

Not out of mind at all Cookie. I get off thinking about their misery and hardship, of course.

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

Auditor #9 wrote:

Do all your dishes rattle when you walk around the house?

No, because I bolt them to the wall.

Another recession tip, don't throw stuff out - fix it.

The amount of good stuff I see dumped in hedges in North Dublin would give you palpitations.

My attitude is that EVERYTHING can be fixed. We should have a fix-it thread...

What would be just as good, is an end-planned-obsolescence thread.

Planned obsolescence creates a false increase in demand instead of instilling robustness into products.

Pax wrote:

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

Auditor #9 wrote:

Do all your dishes rattle when you walk around the house?

No, because I bolt them to the wall.

Another recession tip, don't throw stuff out - fix it.

The amount of good stuff I see dumped in hedges in North Dublin would give you palpitations.

My attitude is that EVERYTHING can be fixed. We should have a fix-it thread...

What would be just as good, is an end-planned-obsolescence thread.

Planned obsolescence creates a false increase in demand instead of instilling robustness into products.

Boo! It ensures a continuous supply of economic growth, profit and advancement.

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:

Pax wrote:

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

Auditor #9 wrote:

Do all your dishes rattle when you walk around the house?

No, because I bolt them to the wall.

Another recession tip, don't throw stuff out - fix it.

The amount of good stuff I see dumped in hedges in North Dublin would give you palpitations.

My attitude is that EVERYTHING can be fixed. We should have a fix-it thread...

What would be just as good, is an end-planned-obsolescence thread.

Planned obsolescence creates a false increase in demand instead of instilling robustness into products.

Boo! It ensures a continuous supply of economic growth, profit and advancement.

It also widens the gap in the quality of life between the rich and the poor.

johnfás wrote:

Ya take our products but won't pay our tax - you dastardly exile, Slim Buddha.

They are the rules, Johnfàs. And as a legal bod, I have no doubt you respect them as fully as I do. Oh, and I always make sure to get the max on the duty free as well.

I paid enough tax to the Irish government over the years and saw what the buffoons did with it. It would absolutely kill me to know I was contributing to Mary Harney's pension, which she is already claiming, if I was paying tax there now.

Qed -> it is for health reasons that I live in Zürich.

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

My attitude is that EVERYTHING can be fixed. We should have a fix-it thread...

The problem is that a lot of the necessary repair skills are not taught these days and what is taught is generally limited to board pulling rather than component level repair.

Regards...jmcc

Quote :

Qed -> it is for health reasons that I live in Zürich.

I have visions of a sanitorium in the mountains, with hefty nurses and saunas that look like American fridges. I hope you're writing a novel there...

Kate P wrote:

Quote :

Qed -> it is for health reasons that I live in Zürich.

I have visions of a sanitorium in the mountains, with hefty nurses and saunas that look like American fridges. I hope you're writing a novel there...

Such places exist, as you know, Kate, but I declined the "hefty nurses" option on my health insurance. Too busy to write anything these days but in 2 years I may have the time to engage in something like that. If Harney is still health minister, I may feel enraged enough to do it.

The Centra in Temple Bar (just across from the Ha'penny Bridge) is selling a chicken fillet roll for €2.

evercloserunion wrote:

The Centra in Temple Bar (just across from the Ha'penny Bridge) is selling a chicken fillet roll for €2.

I found a €2 coin while waiting for the bus on Friday so that would pay for it!

Kate P wrote:

We may be recession shopping but I just can't do Penneys. I used to and there are times when I'm still tempted but when stuff is that cheap, everyone has to be getting screwed. For a four Euro shirt, to make a profit, pay the staff, the light, the heat, the rent, the materials, the transport, the seamstress (and there's a lot of stitching in a shirt, even for Penneys and even on a production line) - it just isn't possible and as far as I'm concerned, it just isn't right.

I cannot justify it. I don't know who's getting screwed in other companies if they have the same low costs but a bigger margin, but Penneys have form and when it's obvious that everyone involved must be paid peanuts, I just can't buy into it now even if I did when I was a skint student. Now I'm a skint self-employed person and would do without first.


TKMaxx, however I can buy into but only early in the morning when the place is quiet. The stuff is good quality and the markdowns are enormous. In terms of value, it's much better even if the initial cost of purchase is higher. What the cost base of producers is, I've no idea - particularly labour costs but there's a greater satisfaction for me in buying something that's probably had a massive profit margin eliminated and is closer in price to the value of production. At least the producer is probably getting those costs back.

Very true. In bargainous situations like that I keep thinking of the anti-slavery movement and some consumer in 180(-whatever) deciding to not go for the cheaper-than-cheap, guaranteed, slavery brand sugar.
(which was probably called Uncle Bens or something just to add even more salt into the wounds)

That person probably died without slavery being banned but at least they made a difference while they lived.


Pennys have been caught out in the lucrative busines of slaving-the-6-year-old-kids-on-the-banks-of-the-Yangtze/Ganges/Amazon/Nile, to extract sweet, sweet profit (and tears) from cotton, way too many times to go in there with a clean conscience.

Primark on your collar makes you either naive or cold. Terribly, terribly cold.

Pax wrote:

Kate P wrote:

We may be recession shopping but I just can't do Penneys. I used to and there are times when I'm still tempted but when stuff is that cheap, everyone has to be getting screwed. For a four Euro shirt, to make a profit, pay the staff, the light, the heat, the rent, the materials, the transport, the seamstress (and there's a lot of stitching in a shirt, even for Penneys and even on a production line) - it just isn't possible and as far as I'm concerned, it just isn't right.

I cannot justify it. I don't know who's getting screwed in other companies if they have the same low costs but a bigger margin, but Penneys have form and when it's obvious that everyone involved must be paid peanuts, I just can't buy into it now even if I did when I was a skint student. Now I'm a skint self-employed person and would do without first.


TKMaxx, however I can buy into but only early in the morning when the place is quiet. The stuff is good quality and the markdowns are enormous. In terms of value, it's much better even if the initial cost of purchase is higher. What the cost base of producers is, I've no idea - particularly labour costs but there's a greater satisfaction for me in buying something that's probably had a massive profit margin eliminated and is closer in price to the value of production. At least the producer is probably getting those costs back.

Very true. In bargainous situations like that I keep thinking of the anti-slavery movement and some consumer in 180(-whatever) deciding to not go for the cheaper-than-cheap, guaranteed, slavery brand sugar.
(which was probably called Uncle Bens or something just to add even more salt into the wounds)

That person probably died without slavery being banned but at least they made a difference while they lived.


Pennys have been caught out in the lucrative busines of slaving-the-6-year-old-kids-on-the-banks-of-the-Yangtze/Ganges/Amazon/Nile, to extract sweet, sweet profit (and tears) from cotton, way too many times to go in there with a clean conscience.

Primark on your collar makes you either naive or cold. Terribly, terribly cold.

What about the many other companies that treat workers like dirt though? Aren't Nestlé, Coca Cola et al also pretty bad for it (or at least have been in the past)? Is it only when maltreatment of workers and social irresponsibility leads to more affordable prices that it becomes intolerable?

evercloserunion wrote:

Pax wrote:

Kate P wrote:

We may be recession shopping but I just can't do Penneys. I used to and there are times when I'm still tempted but when stuff is that cheap, everyone has to be getting screwed. For a four Euro shirt, to make a profit, pay the staff, the light, the heat, the rent, the materials, the transport, the seamstress (and there's a lot of stitching in a shirt, even for Penneys and even on a production line) - it just isn't possible and as far as I'm concerned, it just isn't right.

I cannot justify it. I don't know who's getting screwed in other companies if they have the same low costs but a bigger margin, but Penneys have form and when it's obvious that everyone involved must be paid peanuts, I just can't buy into it now even if I did when I was a skint student. Now I'm a skint self-employed person and would do without first.


TKMaxx, however I can buy into but only early in the morning when the place is quiet. The stuff is good quality and the markdowns are enormous. In terms of value, it's much better even if the initial cost of purchase is higher. What the cost base of producers is, I've no idea - particularly labour costs but there's a greater satisfaction for me in buying something that's probably had a massive profit margin eliminated and is closer in price to the value of production. At least the producer is probably getting those costs back.

Very true. In bargainous situations like that I keep thinking of the anti-slavery movement and some consumer in 180(-whatever) deciding to not go for the cheaper-than-cheap, guaranteed, slavery brand sugar.
(which was probably called Uncle Bens or something just to add even more salt into the wounds)

That person probably died without slavery being banned but at least they made a difference while they lived.


Pennys have been caught out in the lucrative busines of slaving-the-6-year-old-kids-on-the-banks-of-the-Yangtze/Ganges/Amazon/Nile, to extract sweet, sweet profit (and tears) from cotton, way too many times to go in there with a clean conscience.

Primark on your collar makes you either naive or cold. Terribly, terribly cold.

What about the many other companies that treat workers like dirt though? Aren't Nestlé, Coca Cola et al also pretty bad for it (or at least have been in the past)? Is it only when maltreatment of workers and social irresponsibility leads to more affordable prices that it becomes intolerable?

Absolutely, - not.
I'm pretty much non-discriminating in being against treating workers like dirt* no matter what section of the corporate party are involved in it.

In fact, a middling reform would be to set up regulations whereby if corporations are found to engage in such practices they loose their permits to trade and are brought to book before a criminal court. Along with regulations whereby we know whether clothing or products come under certain minimum standards.

*(being honest, I'm against wage-slavery and exploitation as a concept so it's degrees we're talking about here.)

I bought a new pillow in Tesco for 74 cent this evening... and a pack of 10 DVD-R's for 2 euro.

I got a shirt and tie in Dunnes for €11.

I think I've stopped shopping altogether. Is that wrong?

cactus flower wrote:

I think I've stopped shopping altogether. Is that wrong?

Have you got everything you need so?

Auditor #9 wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

I think I've stopped shopping altogether. Is that wrong?

Have you got everything you need so?

Well, I buy bread and milk and petrol ( a little). Otherwise, pretty well, I do.

Easter Eggs seem to be very cheap this year.

petrol prices are creeping up again

I noticed that and they're going to jump again following the budget.

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