As I looked through my inbox this morning, I was getting all excited with all the advertisements for Black Friday sales. Really, that sweater that I absolutely ADORE is 40% off? Old Navy has their entire store on sale for 30% off? Ooooh, those gorgeous earrings are 60% off! And all those warm turtleneck sweaters from Lands End are on sale too! This is wonderful! Think of all the money I can save!!!
.... But really, how much would I save? If I spend money on things that I want but don't need, even if they are on sale, how much am I saving? I have come to realize that when I don't have the budget for those things, it's ridiculous to pick them up anyways simply because they are on a great sale! In fact, unless I have the budget for them, even sales on things I need shouldn't sway me. In two days, I will have a fresh 2 week budget, and then, and ONLY THEN, can I justify spending more money.
Now, don't get me wrong. A couple of months ago there were more diaper sales than I could budget for. We went above our budget and used ...*gasp*... the credit card... on diapers. Some of those boxes of diapers were close to 50% off and I just could not pass that up. I don't have a budget for splurging when there's a good sale, but on occasion, I do it anyways. We didn't have to buy diapers for over 2 months! In that 2 months, we had to fix the van a couple of times and other stuff went wrong and I ended up being so thankful that the diaper budget could be used on other necessary things. (Can you hear the "BUT" coming?)
But, (here it is,) that was a rare occasion in which I know 100% for certain that I would absolutely need the product no matter what. When I get close to running out of diapers, I need more. That's just a fact of life for us right now. I knew for certain that spending more now would save me money later on something that I cannot possibly live without.
A sweater? Those earrings? All those awesome tunic style shirts that will actually cover my ridiculously long torso? Yes, if I have the budget, I can grab a couple. But I cannot justify "saving all that money" and getting things that I can live without.
The only way that purchasing sale items actually saves you money is if you have a budget for something. When you have a budget for something and you spend less than you thought you needed to, you actually have money left. That's saving. When you spend without a budget, I don't care how much of a discount it is, it's not saving! It's still spending more than you were going to in the first place.
Would I have gone out and purchased that sweater when it wasn't on sale yesterday? No way. Would I have gone out and purchased diapers when they weren't on sale? Yep. So there's the difference. If I wasn't planning to purchase the product without a sale, than unless I have the budget to use, I shouldn't purchase the product even on a great sale.
Be careful with all the "savings", make sure you aren't spending more than you budgeted for just because things are on sale. That's not savings at all, that's just a ploy to get more of your money, not less.
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