Save money. Live better.

Today marks six months in which I have not stepped foot inside a Walmart store.  That’s quite an undertaking in a small town like Hays, where sometimes about the only place one can find something is the Super Walmart north of the interstate. 

I started this exercise in February after having watched Robert Greenwald’s documentary Walmart: The High Cost of Low Price.  This film was uncomfortable to watch because of its witness to the “way we do business” in this country – the primary tool is exploitation. The reason: simply unfettered greed.  This film was uncomfortable because of all the times I’ve tried to forget that all that clothing “made in China” came at a very high personal cost to a very real person in China.

Certainly Walmart is not the only corporation “big box store” that is making small town mom and pop businesses obsolete.  Nor is it the only corporation that engages in unfair labor practices here in the US  and slave labor conditions in countries with even more lax regulations than ours.  This is perhaps why my little action of “boycotting” Walmart, means nothing at all to the corporate world.  But it means something to me.

Sometimes I’ve had to pay a little more for something in one of our local stores; sometimes I can’t even find what I “think I need”—but this has been an opportunity in looking at how much my “needs” have really been “wants”.  In some ways, too, this exercise has actually saved me money.  By not having instant access to things I  think need, I have a chance to the true necessity of an item.  By not traipsing up and down colorful aisles beckoning to me with their treasures, I do not cave in to impulse spending.

How long will I be able to keep this up?  Who knows?  But for six months, Walmart has not received a dime from me. 

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