hi everyone welcome back to my youtube channel today's video is going to be about black friday
and how to shop black friday more sustainably now that's a bit of an oxymoron because black friday
is inherently a day about consuming and really over consumption so it cannot be sustainable
that's why i added the word more in there right we're trying to make it more sustainable and there
are some real benefits to shopping black friday so i will cover those now so the first tip is to make
sure that it is something that you really want slash need something that you know is actually
going to get a lot of use and not something that you're just upgrading because the coolest newest
thing has come out when you have something that works perfectly well in its place so you may not
know that electronics in general have something built into them called planned obsolescence
where they are no longer being supported that are kind of defunct after a short amount of
time when actually those things are usable for quite a bit longer and the issue comes
from a lot of these big companies that are no longer supporting older devices if we put more
pressure on them to support these older devices then we won't be replacing things all the time
i believe the statistic is something like 80 percent of all of the iphones sold last year
which were in the millions went to people who already had an iphone they were just upgrading
this is a problem we don't need to be adding this many new phones every year our phones can probably
just have some software updates and be pretty much up to speed with where they need to be if they had
better battery life if they updated the software of the cameras a lot of the times we would really
be getting everything that we really do with an upgrade so of course phones and electronics are
not the only issue this is just something in general to think about do you have something
that works perfectly well that you don't need to replace that item and if you are going to replace
that item or you are going to get something new is it filling a gap in your life in your
wardrobe whatever that's going to be and will you actually use that thing the sort of golden number
for sustainability in terms of clothing is getting at least 30 wears from each garment brings me to
my next point are you buying something that is high enough quality that it is going to last this
purchase gonna allow you to get 30 wares out of it is it going to allow you to use it for years that
sort of thing so make sure that what you're buying is high quality again ties nicely into the next
point which is buy something that you were already going to buy and just save money on that thing
it also allows you to potentially buy something that would have previously been out of your price
range but maybe is higher quality is the thing you really want and is the thing that is going
to get a ton of wear so that's the reason i most love this holiday i kind of know the things that i
already want to buy and then i can save a bunch of money on them similar vein buying something
with a list having a list of the items that you really want is really really helpful to avoid
those impulse purchases all of a sudden you see oh my gosh this is 70 off i need to have it that's
a very real desire that we have and advertisers play on that all the time so keeping to your list
making sure that these are items that you know you really want maybe that you've already reviewed
that you know are going to be high quality and that you know are going to work for you and try to
avoid those impulse purchases another reason that is really helpful is because you can try to avoid
returns returns are a real problem and i might do a whole video about the issue with returns and how
many items actually get returned and reused but returns if you can avoid them that's helpful so
if you've already figured out the item you want to buy you've probably seen reviews and you've looked
at sizing and you've looked at how different people have talked about how this item fits
if it's clothing right or or just in general you've seen reviews and you know that this is
most likely going to work for you maybe you've even tried it on in person all of those things are
really helpful and allow you to have a much better chance of not returning this item said you can
shop local so i am someone who does not really love the idea of like midnight black friday
opening sales right after thanksgiving i think it's a time to enjoy your family if you celebrate
and so i don't love that i would prefer to do my local shopping on small business saturday if it is
a small business but you can also look into if the businesses you're buying from have the option to
buy online but then pick up in store so that can be a really nice way to even do like a curbside
pickup or something like that which would help cut down on the shipping and transportation
issues which are a big part of the online buying and it just gets so frenzied between black friday
and the like christmas holidays the next tip is to try to buy presents that people actually want
what are the people in your life actually going to want and use and if you can't buy something
that is sustainable for them make sure it is something that will get a ton of uses for them
ask people what they want i mean sometimes you can you know someone well enough that you can
kind of pick something out but sometimes we just buy random tchotchkes because we're like well this
somebody is going to need this i'm going to need a gift to give to someone that's not super helpful
right try to find something that at least has a lower carbon footprint if you do need some random
gifts for people but try to try to ask people what they're actually going to use you don't want
someone to take a gift that they don't actually really want it's kind of that awkward situation
and then if it just like sits in a drawer and never gets used then that's not helpful for anyone
last tip is to try to shop from brands that support your values so whatever that
might look like for you right what are your values and what brands do you want to support
that really showcase that value like a two-in-one right you're supporting that brand
you're getting an item that you really like or you know someone else is really gonna like
and you're trying to maybe take away from a lot of these corporations that are really
just pumping out that over consumption or making cheap like really really low quality
items that are just kind of having this massive turnover right if we want to avoid fast fashion
then we should try to not promote fast fashion and not pay for fast fashion that sort of thing so
use black friday as a way to support those brands that really could use the money so i hope that
those tips were helpful for you this should maybe make you feel a little bit better about ways you
can go about doing that black friday shopping especially if you were going to do it anyway
and you do want to try to do it with a little bit more of a sustainable lens i hope you all have a
wonderful day and have good luck finding those perfect purchases see you in another video bye