Redefining Frugal: Identifying Big Priorities

I have a friend, I’ll call her Karen, who has been trying her best recently to spend less money.  With retirement portfolio having taken a hit and job uncertainty all around, spending less (and saving more) money is certainly the prudent thing for to do.  The problem is, many of Karen’s money saving actions seem to be backfiring.  She purchases bulk products to save on unit costs and bulk services (like annual gym membership) since per use costs seem rather high.  Unfortunately, because Karen is currently single and has to travel a lot, the perishable bulk foods usually end up about half discarded.  The gym membership seems a bit better, but I’m not sure that the annual membership divided by the per use fee equals out.

It’s clear in Karen’s case, buying bulk foods is not the answer.  For now, it would be more economical (and less wasteful) for her to purchase smaller quantities of foods, perhaps even using the very costly per ounce visit to the grocery store salad bar to buy a small amount of different kinds of fresh vegetables.  Karen’s choice of an annual gym pass though is quite interesting.  Although money-wise, it may work out to a relatively high per use cost, having the annual pass cuts down  The less money answer (per unit or in total) is not necessarily the right answer. Karen really liked the convenience of not having to pay and fill out a new form each time, and having the pass in her wallet incentivized her to go to the gym and make a special pilates class on Tuesdays.  In addition, with the yearly pass she had certain advantages like discounts on massage sessions and the ability to bring guests.  In other words, it seemed like the right situation for her.

The discussion with Karen about the gym pass led me to muse, “Is being frugal really about getting as much (stuff) as possible for as little (money) as possible?” Or perhaps it is more about something more practical in guiding how we lead our lives.  Wikipedia talks about frugality as being resourceful in order to acheive longer-term goals.  That makes a lot of sense to me.  And to me frugality is about being a good steward to limited resources and making choices that are, for me, long-term sustainable.

When thinking of it from the resource standpoint, I have to admit, although I need to be mindful of spending and be prudent with cash, my biggest resource constraint is time.  Thus, it doesn’t make sense for me to spend hours and hours on something that might yield only a small amount of savings.  Sustainability also means the ability to continuously carry out good habits day after day.  As I pointed out in my post on Why Saving is Like Dieting, these good habits need to be reasonable enough to continue to prudently day-after-day.  So for Karen, being frugal means having an annual gym pass and using it as often as she can.  And for me, being frugal is about finding the right combination of steps that strike a reasonable balance between time and money, and that are environmentally sound and long-term implementable.  So, I buy pre-washed cut up vegetables and some organic foods to ensure that we have very healthful meals that don’t take up a huge amount of time to prepare, and I have a number of gadgets (like a cellphone with bluetooth headset and a scanner) so that I can run a high quality home office.  Examining my priorities has helped me to become a better steward of my limited resources.

see more frugal thoughts this week at Student Scrooge