Here's the thing nobody tells you about a No Buy Year...

PLUS, a new challenge for 2025!

Maybe they never told you because maybe it never happened to anyone else.

Just to me. But I don’t think this can be 100% correct.

I’ve gone back and forth with the idea of this newsletter.

There’s a part of me that doesn’t want to write this, to just pretend that my no buy year ended and that I’ve only bought a few select items, which is how I envisioned I’d behave.

THEN, there’s a part of me, the excited part, that wants to tell you about the amazing things I’ve bought since my no buy ended.

AND ALSO, a part of me that feels guilty for the things that I’ve bought, like I’ve failed somehow.

BUT, the part of me that’s writing to you is the part that wants to be fully transparent about this journey; to share the good, the bad and the ugly.

So, what is it that nobody tells you?

There might be a rebound period!

When my no buy year ended on October 14, I felt really positive and good about where my head was in regards to shopping. I wasn’t planning to go crazy and buy a bunch of stuff to make up for the absence of shopping over the past year.

No siree.

But here’s the thing about plans:

“The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry” - Robert Burns

And in hindsight, I didn’t even have a real plan in place. I just assumed that I hadn’t shopped for a whole year so obviously I had lots of self-control and it would all be fine.

My only “rule” was to not buy anything unless I really loved it. But here’s where the problem arises:

I came across too many things that I loved!

I now realize that it would have been useful to have some guidelines, or rules, in place. But I was resistant to rules at the time because I felt like I had spent so many years being restrictive and I didn’t want to continue doing that.

I wanted to be able to shop and only buy one thing or walk away empty-handed.

I wanted to be able to buy things and not feel guilty about it later.

I have this perception that most of the population functions like this, but I really do wonder if I’m as alone as I feel sometimes.

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Which makes me wonder how you shop?

So, I have a few questions to ask and your responses (fully anonymous) would be really helpful:

If you’d like to share more about your shopping habits, or any rules that you use to not shop, I’d love to read about them in the comments!

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It’s been 2 months since the no buy ended. I estimate that I have gone shopping about 7 times. Each time, I’ve come home with at least one clothing item, but most times, more than one…actually, it was more than one every time! And I’ve ordered something online twice.

That’t a shopping average of 1x/week.

In total, I’ve purchased 30 preloved items and 2 new items, so 32 additions* in total. That’s an average of about 2.6 items/month over the past year, which if I had done that, it wouldn’t be bad at all.

BUT I’ve done that in 2 months! This is not sustainable!

* Most were thrifted at a cost of $4 or less and a few were purchased with credit from consignment, so I didn’t spend a lot on these items, which is a problem in itself when it comes to thrifting.

A few of the items that I’ve bought since my No Buy Year ended.

Everything I’ve purchased:

~New~

Adidas Sneakers

TenTree Puffer Coat

~Preloved (Thrifted/Consignment)~

Outerwear

3 Vests (1 black puffer, 1 navy wool, 1 grey holiday)

2 light jackets (1 orange*, 1 floral)

Sweaters / Shirts / Tops

3 sweaters (1 grey, 1 olive green, 1 fleece)

3 cardigans (black, green, purple)

4 shirts (2 striped, 2 checkered*)

4 Tops (1 white cotton t-shirt, 1 black sheer t-shirt, 1 tie front, 1 black long sleeve)

5 Tank Tops (1 red crochet, 1 green textured, 1 navy merino wool, 1 blue sweater vest), 1 black silk w/ lace)

Bottoms

1 skirt

3 pants (1 black, 1 green-grey, blue/white striped lounge)

1 pair of jeans

Shoes

1 pair of shoes (navy/white oxfords)

* I thrifted some items to sell on Poshmark after watching some reselling videos on YouTube, but ultimately gave a few of them to friends and kept a couple for myself because I don’t think I’d want to hold onto a lot of items until they sold. I was very surprised by how much I liked an orange jacket!

I also think it would encourage me to buy more things and I want to move in the opposite direction.

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The amount of shopping that I have done has been weighing really heavily on me. I’ve felt it every time I’ve walked into my closet lately. Or every time I put on one of the items that I bought. And in a way, it dampened my enjoyment of those items.

I remember writing that I didn’t think the no buy year had cured me of my shopping addiction, that all of the work that I had put in over the years meant that I was cured before I even started the challenge.

And I definitely don’t want to diminish all of the work that I’ve done over the past decade, but I think I had rose-colored glasses on when I wrote all of that. I think I was so excited for the end of the challenge and the fact that I had made it through that I wasn’t anticipating that I still had work to do.

I think I’ll always have work to do.

I honestly don’t know if I’ll ever get my shit together when it comes to shopping!

Which is why I’ve decided to do a LOW BUY YEAR in 2025!

I have been thinking a lot about this for the past week and it just feels right.

And, if you feel like this challenge would be good for you, I’d love for you to join me!

Next week, I will provide more details about my plan and also share a PDF Plan + Tracker for you to use to plan and track your own low buy in 2025!

We can all be accountability partners - at the end of each month, I will have an accountability post where I will share my purchases, any struggles or triumphs and some thoughts on the past month. You can also share how you’ve done that month with the community as well.

Let me know in the comments if this is something you’d be interested in doing with me, or if you’re more comfortable doing so, shoot me an email and we can chat about it!

And, if you know somebody who might also be interested in this challenge, please share this newsletter with them - the more, the merrier!

xx Gillian 💕