47 places you can stop spending money at
Choosing to *not* buy with intention in attempt to feel a little less powerless </3
Donald Trump is officially the President of the United States, and we here at Good Little Garbage Girl think that is gross (not to get political, haha hehe).
In his second term, how do we not feel hopeless? It’d be my preference to close my eyes for the next four years and open them when it’s all over. But doing that doesn’t guarantee that anything better will reveal itself when his time is up. In fact, I’d argue that shutting out the world for four years makes it even more likely that the world will continue to be shit upon re-entrance.
Just trying to be inspirational here. One way to take action and say something along the lines of, Hey, I don’t like this, is to vote with your dollar. This is not to say Go Shopping!! Instead, embrace your desire to shop less and disentangle yourself from this complicated culture of consumerism by refusing to spend a penny at companies that helped President Chump regain his power.
Isn’t it so absolutely bizarre that a company like Buffalo Wild Wings would spend money in politics? There’s something a little funny about the idea (Mr. President, we’d like to remind you that our BOGO deals run Monday through Thursday), but then you dig just a teeny, tiny, little itty bit beyond the surface and you come to realize that everything is about money. Always. Never not. (BTW, plenty of corporations donate funds to support democratic candidates as well, and it’s fair to argue that this is wrong, too. But I’m not doing that right now, ok??)
And so, in the name of money, I’m sharing 47 places/brands/companies on which you can not spend yours if you’d like to say something along the lines of Um, could you guys stop? or I hate what you did or Why wouldn’t you spend that money to help, like, buffalo herds?
This list comes from data provided by Goods Unite Us. The site and app categorizes companies by their political affiliations/donations. It was created with the mission to “empower people to become political consumers and investors so that we can all collectively put an end to corporate political donations.” If you’re interested in shopping (or not shopping) with your dollar, check it out — you can type in any company/brand to see where they’re spending. Some of it will upset you (you might never be able to eat a Kit Kat with good conscience again) and for that I am sorry. The good news is that your Milky Ways and Snickers are safe (for now).
It’s worth mentioning: This is not a call to throw away items you own that were produced by any of the boogers below. That would be silly and wasteful and beside the point (remember when some people were burning their Nikes? Me neither.)
If anything, this is just a prompt to be more thoughtful about how you spend your dollars. Putting thought into how you buy is probably the first step to creating less garbage, and isn’t that a pretty simple entry point? I often write about secondhand and DIY and resisting consumerism’s haunted whispers. This is just another way to employ your personal power and free will to support your personal values, which I think feels good and may help make the next four years a bit more tolerable.
I also want to say, if you do continue to spend money at any of the below businesses, truly whatever. Who am I to tell you not to stop at Dunkin’ when you really need to pee and caffeinate? I’m sure I will spend my dollars at some of the places over the next four years (Hot Wheels currently has a monopoly over my household). But I will at least think about it differently? And always opt for secondhand first, whenever possible.
OK, onto the list! I chose these by their relevance to me and how they pinged my brain (you can find many, many, many more in the app). Some of them I found surprising and some of them I thought you’d want to know and some of them just made me laugh (a coping mechanism).
47 companies from which to withhold your hard-earned money
AAA (
Ace Hardware
Almond Joy (owned by Hershey)
AMC Theaters
Anthropologie
Apples to Apples (like the board game, lmao — fear not, Scrabble is safe)
Barbie (Mattel) — that bitch
Blue Moon
Brooks Running (Ugh, seriously?)
Buffalo Wild Wings
Budweiser
Busch
Caviar (the food delivery service)
Coors
Chick-Fil-A (duh)
Chico’s
Command AND Scotch (both 3M), so good luck buying tape, libs!
DoorDash
Dick’s Sporting Goods
Dunkin’ Donuts
Duracell
Fisher Price
Free People
Frye
Greyhound Bus Lines
Hanes
Hand & Stone Massage and Facial Spa (literally do not touch me)
Hobby Lobby
Home Depot (“Based on Goods Unite Us’s independent analysis, this is company is one of the top 25 contributors to the group of Senators who flipped the Supreme Court conservative.”)
Hot Wheels (Fisher Price)
Jockey
Juicy Couture
Kit Kat (owned by Hershey)
Krispy Kreme Doughnuts
Life is Good (With that smiley face logo, it’s just audacious.)
LL Bean
Lowe’s
New Balance
North Face
Peet’s Coffee
Petco
Postmates
SeaWorld (just put this one here for laughs because of course)
Taco Bell
Victoria’s Secret
Wendy’s
Yuengling
I’m extra curious to know what you think about this not-buying action plan. Please do sound off in the comments below!
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Life is Good?!?! I thought this was a tree-hugging, nature-loving hippie company. Oh well, maybe we should all just stop shopping retail and thrift our goods, repurchase and reuse 😍
LL Bean hurts.