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The Reasons Why I Don’t Waste Money On Name-Brand Items

  • Zak 
name-brand items, reasons not to buy name-brand items

I don’t buy name-brand items for a few reasons, and I want to share them because I truly believe that they can help you gain control of your money. Whether intentional or not, we have all developed certain habits and ideas about money that fuel our financial decisions. They can be constructive or destructive, but more importantly, they can be changed.

Even though I grew up in a below-average household, I always assumed that I understood money. Boy, was I wrong!

It was only in my twenties that I realized how financially immature I was. Honestly, my experience with money has been interesting. It was empowering at first, but then the dopamine rush of swiping my cards or clicking on the Buy Now button sent me down a dark path of overconsumption and overspending.

I can see how name-brand items appeal to our need for easy dopamine, social status, and validation.

Everything that these brands work on is to convince you to part with money. They’re attacking you from every direction until you concede to their idea of associating your worth, value, and happiness with the acquisition of their product.

I don’t want to be a slave to the marketing strategies or social pressures created by these branded companies.

It took me a while and a lot of trial and error to rebuild my financial habits and to change my relationship with money and materialism.

But I did it, and I’m so happy because I have more financial freedom now than ever before.

This article will help you to do the same.

Related article: A simple guide to living below your means

Why I Don’t Buy Name-Brand Products

reasons not to waste money on name-brands

1. I have important financial goals

Money becomes such an instrumental part of adult life, yet little time is spared to think about how we actually perceive it.

A relationship with money can be healthy or unhealthy, and in my case, it was unhealthy because I used money as a tool for retail therapy.

I wanted to numb my pain and seek out quick bursts of dopamine. It took some failure and financial troubles for me to understand how my perception of money was destructive. I spent a significant amount of time reading books on the topic and watching countless Dave Ramsey videos to change my financial ideas and habits.

It became clear to me that I used money the way people use food. To change my relationship with money, I needed to understand it and myself better.

Here’s what I learned about how to set financial goals:

Financial goals should be meaningful or sentimental to you. Furthermore, they should inspire feelings of excitement, hope, or motivation as encouragement and fuel to pursue them. Lastly, the realisation of these goals should effect real change in your life.

Satisfy these requirements, and you’ll set financial goals that alter your relationship with money forever.

Ironically, I realized that name-brand items don’t have much of a place in my life.

I cherish experiences and financial freedom more than the possession of material goods.

So that is what I focus my attention and financial decisions on.

Related article: Why I’m choosing to become a minimalist

2. Quality and affordability matter more than a brand

Having not really experienced social validation stemming from the ownership of name-brand items, I don’t think I developed a desire for them.

Even during my phase of financial recklessness, I didn’t really care so much about brands. I just wanted or needed to get a jolt of dopamine from making a purchase.

Very few things necessitate the need for name-brand items.

Apart from cars and technological devices, most name-brand items provide not much more than a social signal for wealth.

When you begin to prize quality and affordability, it’s easy to not waste money on name-brand products because there are many competing products on the market that use these two metrics as a way of separating themselves.

This might change in the future if the need for social validation arises, but right now, as a minimalist, whatever I own needs to be qualitative and functional.

What I like about this mindset is that when I buy something, even if I splurge, I know that it’s an item I truly want based on research, quality, and affordability, not some item that I’m told to want because of the brand name.

3. I can feel special without name-brand items

When everyone around you is striving to increase their social value by wearing name-brand items, the only way to separate yourself from the crowd is to wear something different, wear something most people cannot afford to access, or be different.

The latter stands out to me most because what it takes to be different than most people is a lot of work, vision, and change.

The man with muscles will always stand out more and be viewed with more respect than the average or out-of-shape man wearing a name-brand t-shirt.

This is an observation that I’ve made with my own two eyes.

When I was in tremendous shape, people didn’t even care about what I wore. What they noticed was my physique, and it garnered praise.

Out of shape, my clothes would start getting some attention.

Of the two, I felt absolutely amazing when compliments or attention were directed at me rather than an item I owned.

Experiencing this made me realize that social validation only matters to me when it is attached to genuine personal accomplishments.

I lost interest in name-brand items even more when I realized that I could garner attention and praise through my own actions.

Simply put, if you want to feel special, be or do something special.

Related article: 7 Types of clothes to declutter from your closet

4. I don’t want unnecessary stress in my life

As it is right now, to achieve anything meaningful as an adult requires experiencing some stress.

Working a job is stressful, building a business is stressful, getting in shape is physically stressful, managing time is stressful, and so on and so forth.

All of this excludes the stress that comes from unexpected obstacles and catastrophic events that occur in life, like health ailments, breakups, deaths, and accidents.

So why would I stress myself out about owning name-brand items? Wouldn’t it make more sense for me to be selective about what type of stress I take on?

It’s important to chase your goals, and if being incredibly wealthy is something you really want, go after it.

But don’t pursue it in a way that destroys your life, because that defeats the purpose of becoming wealthy.

The pursuit of name-brand items doesn’t make me more money. But the pursuit of more money easily affords me name-brand items.

Which should I focus on more, then?

The money!

Thankfully, I don’t care about name-brand items, but this illustrates the importance of focusing on the right things in life.

Related article: The advantages of owning less

These are the reasons why I don’t waste money on name-brand items. I hope that you consider some of my ideas and try to implement them in your life so that you can gain a greater relationship with money as a whole. At the same time, if there’s anything you’d like to share with me that I could benefit from, please let me know in the comment section below. 😀

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