Don't shop for the holidays as if it were the holidays!

by TheFrogPrince&Family

How do I save money over the Holidays? My best frugal holiday tip for that is to not shop as if you are shopping for the holidays. That isn’t to say that you should not be in the spirit of giving. What I do mean to say is that you need to give in a spirit other than the media-fed mass-consumerism which the holidays are packaged in.

Forget about the idea that the value of a gift is in its price tag. Forget about the stereotype that homemade gifts are always tacky. Forget about quantity of packages meaning more than the thoughtfulness of the gifts. And for God’s sake, unless you’re shopping for one Christmas during the post-Christmas clearance of the year before, take everything you see in the seasonal department with a few grains of salt.

You can put together a gorgeous and personalized gift basket in barely more time than it will take you to fight/pick your way through to them in a seasonal department to buy one ready-made, and it will cost about 1/5 of the price or less. Most seasonal items are priced up simply because they are packaged, sometimes only marketed/labeled as seasonal items, the same way that the same white pillar candle you can buy at the dollar store suddenly costs $5 if you buy it in the “Bridal” department.