When frugality doesn't pay off

[HundredK]

We've been making tons of changes to our lifestyle in order to cut expenses. One of the things I did was switch from Tide to the Target branded Up&Up laundry detergent. All was well, loved how it cleaned and smelled, everything was good. Until I started getting hives all over my skin wherever clothing laundered in that detergent touched me. Soooo. Had to go buy a whole bunch of Tide and re-launder everything in our house. Expensive lesson learned!

Do any of you have Frugality Failure stories?

[disneysteve]

Do any of you have Frugality Failure stories?

Over the years, we have always made it a point to be willing to try store brands for almost everything. Some have been just fine. Some have been not as good but good enough. Some were just plain awful. And a few were actually better than the brand name.

The people that I have no patience for are the ones who aren't even willing to try the store brand because they believe it must be inferior.

[Fishindude77]

Tools.
Cheap ones never last very long, good tools can last a lifetime.

[disneysteve]

Tools.
Cheap ones never last very long, good tools can last a lifetime.

Cookware.
Got a "good" set as an engagement present. It was shot in a few years. Replaced it with another "good" set which also lasted a few years. There might have been a third "good" set. Then we broke down and bought a set of commercial-grade Calphalon for $400. It is still going strong and still looks brand new. It cooks better. It cleans up better. And we will probably have it for the rest of our lives. It sure beats wasting money on a cheap set every few years.

[cornfieldj]

Made my own eye-makeup remover -- figured, hey it's mostly water! So I found some DIY recipes. Settled on boiled water, tiny bit of baby shampoo and a tiny bit of baby oil.

It worked fine for a few weeks, then I started getting a very mild eye infection -- because there's no preservatives in DIY eye-makeup remover. (Luckily I avoided a doctor visit.)

Since a $6 or $8 bottle of the commercial stuff will last practically forever and is far cheaper than a visit to the eye doctor, I'm back to buying.

[FLA]

glasses if you have a strong and unusual prescription. I bought progressives through an independent store after I had surgery to greatly correct my vision (but I was still left with a strong and unusual script). I put the lenses in 3 yr old frames I had previously bought there for about $200. The lenses used to cost me $1800, now they run $600 at the independent shop.

My new script would be fillable on paper by places like BJs, but none of the online retailers. I went to BJs to get the $89 progressives promotion. The optician was kind enough to tell that their progressives really would not work for me and I would likely be very unhappy. I did get full on reading glasses there so I could read on my side in bed (couldn't do it with the progressives). It cost $89. Good deal but the frames are crap, they need tightening a few times a month.

I'll continue to get cheap glasses at BJs for reading but my day to day glasses are going to come from the independent shop.

[msomnipotent]

We've been making tons of changes to our lifestyle in order to cut expenses. One of the things I did was switch from Tide to the Target branded Up&Up laundry detergent. All was well, loved how it cleaned and smelled, everything was good. Until I started getting hives all over my skin wherever clothing laundered in that detergent touched me. Soooo. Had to go buy a whole bunch of Tide and re-launder everything in our house. Expensive lesson learned!

Do any of you have Frugality Failure stories?

I thought I could only use Tide, too. The Kirkland (Costco) brand with no fragrance doesn't give me a rash, but it doesn't clean as well as Tide IMO. I also can't use anything but Clorox bleach. It wasn't fun finding that out.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

In the hospital they give you pampers diaper samples. Tons. I started on pampers. I thought okay I'm going to try Costco or Target brand right? I mean everyone else uses these cheaper disposables. Well i put one diaper on DK1 and by the time I take it off it's a red mess. I need diaper cream and cloth diapers. Turns out even now I only use aveno body wash. Sigh. I tried different stuff and I even bought her bubble baths, OMG red skin everywhere. So the only bath stuff she can use is Lush or specialty items. It's what she gets for Christmas and birthday. DK2 same thing happened with the diaper. Same story. Except I ran out of diapers and turns out she could only use the MOST expensive pampers when I tried to use a different type of pampers. Yes I tried the cheaper non-cruiser pampers and she was allergic to it as well. So only Pampers swaddlers then cruisers then pullups. OMG OMG OMG. And I coupon shopped and followed every mommy blog to get the best deal on diapers because i was so stuck. Did I mention with my first I tried 4 different types of cloth diapers and I borrowed a couple from neighbors and they all leaked? Turns out and they found this to be true as well, that depending on the kid not all cloth works on every kid. They went through half a dozen before they found one that stuck. I gave up and went to disposable. They ended up with green mountain cloth diapers and i borrowed the z diaper, grovia, the walmart one, and the snappies. I guess having a hip dysplasia harness with that kiddo didn't help. I had to buy leg warmers for her to boot.

Another failure. I breastfeed but wanted a bottle so occasionally I could have a break. I went through every bottle brand for the 1st kid who wouldn't take it. I bought one of every type like they suggested to "trial" it before investing in a set. Kept them and the second kid didn't like it either. Everyone I gave them all too loved them. Oh well.

I also don't use anything but the kirkland or all free and clear laundry detergent. Anything else causes rashes and hives on the skin. I do have homemade stuff but I don't have the patience to always make it with borax and mexican soap and grinding it.

[james.hendrickson]

I thought I could only use Tide, too. The Kirkland (Costco) brand with no fragrance doesn't give me a rash, but it doesn't clean as well as Tide IMO. I also can't use anything but Clorox bleach. It wasn't fun finding that out.

Whats your favorite stuff to get at Costco? That place is really, really popular.

[msomnipotent]

Whats your favorite stuff to get at Costco? That place is really, really popular.

I do a lot of damage in the baking aisle. Their spices are dirt cheap and good quality, especially the dried garlic and onion bottles. Basics like rice, flour, sugar, etc. They are really inexpensive compared to grocery stores for that. I have recently started buying their meat, too. It looks intimidating, but you can easily cut up a Brontosaurus-sized chunk of meat with a little practice.

[HundredK]

Cookware.
Then we broke down and bought a set of commercial-grade Calphalon for $400. It is still going strong and still looks brand new. It cooks better. It cleans up better. And we will probably have it for the rest of our lives. It sure beats wasting money on a cheap set every few years.

I couldn't agree more about this. Way back when, I worked for Williams Sonoma's corporate offices where I got a 40% discount. We loaded up on All Clad pots and Wusthof knives and have never looked back. I'm positive we'll keep them forever.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

I love our calphalon cooking set after 11 years. I haven't invested what I should in knives and I'm debating when I will. I should have 11 years ago when we got married

[StormRichards]

Like Steve, we try a lot of store brand items with the results mostly on the positive side. Only on a few occasions were the negatives so bad it resulted in trashing what was left. So no significant negative impact regarding store brands.

Can't think of any else off hand.

[GoodSteward]

We have learned there are certain categories you just don't need to go cheap. We do a lot of green smoothies. When I frist started i was given a Montel Williams living well blender that costs $150. Not cheap, but I still managed to burn up the motor in about 2 months. Instead of buying another medium level we just got a Blentech w/ 7 year warranty. Still going strong years later, and saves me prep time. Just throw in whatever, frozen or not, and let it go.

Dish soap is another one we stopped buying cheap. We use more to get the same job done, and it still doesn't do as good as Dawn. So we just went back to Dawn. To that point, the cheaper brands are not always as cost saving as it may seem. For cleaning, the products will often not be as effective or require more to do the same job. You are not saving any money this way, but you are having more annoyance.

[disneysteve]

Dish soap is another one we stopped buying cheap. We use more to get the same job done, and it still doesn't do as good as Dawn.

I think that's true of a lot of products. The cheap one requires you to use twice as much and then still doesn't do as good a job. Over the years, we've learned to focus on value, not just price.

Toilet paper is a perfect example. Not to be overly graphic here but I just don't get the point of single ply TP. I just end up using 2-3 times as many sheets to do the job. Just buy the good stuff, which is not double the price, and be done with it.

I thought of another frugal fail. I posted about this when it happened. We were at Ollie's, which is a chain of discount stores. I bought a box of tea bags because the price was about half of what I pay at Wegman's. Then I got home and went to make tea and realized there was a lot less tea in each bag. Sure enough, I looked at the box and the box of 100 tea bags weighed just about the same as my box of 50 Wegman's bags. No wonder the price was half. There was half as much tea.