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Can You Go Without Shopping For 30 Days?

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This post is sponsored by the fine folks at Yerdle. Wanna sponsor a post or advertise on the site? Email us: alex@BrokeAssStuart.com

yerdle coverLet’s face it, we probably all shop a little too much and it can cause all kinds of problems. It fills up our landfills, creates a huge carbon footprint, and don’t forget, it makes us perpetually broke. So, what about committing to not buying anything new for 30 days? Except of course food, beer, and…other ‘necessary perishables’, <ahem>

The gang over at Yerdle have launched a national movement to get people to, well, kind-of-but-not-really shop. It’s called ‘Unshopping’ , the idea is to give away the things you don’t use, and find the things you just may need from other people, not shopping malls. In other words, there is a magical place in your phone where you can exchange anything from books to camping equipment without spending money or adding to the city dump.

I’m encouraging broke-asses to checkout the ‘Unshopping Challenge’ for 30 days as a way to reduce overconsumption and simultaneously score cool shit that someone else may no longer need. If you use this BAS link, the first 100 ‘unshoppers’ to sign up get $25 worth of credit for nothing, which is kind of like getting a $25 gift certificate, only there is no waste or actual money exchanged. It’s an introduction to the gift economy.

You can even unshop my closet, check this out:

Uncle Broke-ass’s Yerdle Closet:
Item 1

unnamed

Warm T-shirt (comes Stuart scented or washed)

Item 2

unnamed (1)

Pre-read zine, complete with fingerprints

Item 3

unnamed (7)

This Baby

Oh wait, they’re telling me they need to keep the baby, but you can still get the sweet BAS onsie.

A great thing about being broke is you have a really small environmental footprint.  No, seriously, poor people are not wrecking the planet.  ‘Unshopping’ is like a recycling program for consumer goods, and the bonus is, it costs you nothing.  We all need somethings, hell, I love…’things’ as much as the next guy, but we all can do a little more in order to trash the planet a lot less.

SIGN UP FOR THE UNSHOPPING CHALLENGE AT: WWW.YERDLE.COM

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Broke-Ass Stuart - Editor In Cheap

Broke-Ass Stuart - Editor In Cheap

Stuart Schuffman, aka Broke-Ass Stuart, is a travel writer, poet, TV host, activist, and general shit-stirrer. His website BrokeAssStuart.com is one of the most influential arts & culture sites in the San Francisco Bay Area and his freelance writing has been featured in Lonely Planet, Conde Nast Traveler, The Bold Italic, Geek.com and too many other outlets to remember. His weekly column, Broke-Ass City, appears every other Thursday in the San Francisco Examiner. Stuart’s writing has been translated into four languages. In 2011 Stuart created and hosted the travel show Young, Broke, and Beautiful on IFC and in 2015 he ran for Mayor of San Francisco and got nearly 20k votes.

He's been called "an Underground legend": SF Chronicle, "an SF cult hero":SF Bay Guardian, and "the chief of cheap": Time Out New York.