Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Late Night Wal-Mart run

Last night I went to Wal-Mart to pick up some body soap and some other things i needed. As i walked into the soap isle, I was bombarded with all the options i had. I looked at the different bottles, brands that i knew, and lastly smelled a few that looked good to choose.

Visual Effect: I narrowed down my options by bottle design and color, looking for both a strong masculine scent and a subtle lingering smell.

Brand Recognition: I narrowed down further to brands that i knew or had used before (brand trust)
*One bottle made it past this stage that i had never used before, its bottle was gray and had a swooping look to it that attracted my eye.

Product Evaluation: I took the last few and smelled their contents. I chose from the one that smelled the best or that gave off the effect that i wanted.

What I learned?
To make the best decision possible, I should have smelled all of the soaps individually and made my decision based from that. Instead, a time factor was initiated and i knew i had to limit my options by narrowing them down. To do this, I looked first at the bottles that caught my eye. then I looked at the brands that i recognized and lessened it down further. With a smaller group to work with, the final decision was based on scent alone. The scent that was chosen satisfied both my wants and needs for my personal smell and the aroma i wanted to project to others.

Monday, October 4, 2010

Who knew that laziness could inspire the birth of a shopaholic.




I hate doing laundry.
I especially hated doing laundry when living in a dorm. It was during this time that i became something of a clothing collector, or as my mom so loving nicknamed me, "a clothes horse".
I found that the more clothes, specifically jeans and hoodies, I owned, the longer I could go without doing laundry and that really fueled my clothes buying craze.
I always assuaged my cognitive dissonance (aka buyers regret to normal people), however, by telling myself that when I had my own place with my own laundry-doing utensils, that I would stop my incessant buying habits and settle down to a few comfy, well-worn and loved jeans and a few basic hoodies.

I have now been living with my own personal laundry and dryer for the better part of six months, and unfortunately, my jeans count is at 15 and my hoodies at 21, and its not stopping. Just last week I bought a pair of jeans, totally on impulse. Well, I felt i needed them at the time. I was about to go on an unexpected date night to indy with my girlfriend and i was wearing shorts. When I left for her house, it was warm, and when we left to go to Indy, i could see my breath. So, she came up with the great idea to go buy a pair of jeans and then return them the next day after using them. Now, a simple 20 dollar pair of jeans would have sufficed, but no, I went to my favorite store and bought the middle-upper level pair of jeans for 45.99. And of course, fell in love with them and never returned them.
The worst part is, is that five days later, I was experiencing some buyers regret but I ripped all the tags off and intentionally threw away the receipt the night I bought the jeans to prevent my future self from returning the jeans.
Will I ever learn? Or will I just continue to fall victim to the ever captivating advertising machine. I guess only time will tell, but until then, I love myself some new jeans.