September 2019 No-Spend Challenge

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Ever heard of a no-spend challenge? Now you have! But how does it work?

Obviously most of us won’t be able to go a full month without spending any money at all. We have to pay our rent or mortgage, our utility bills, transportation costs, and so on.

In a typical month, though, there are lots of things that we spend money on that we really could do without, at least short-term.

I’ve been hearing about no-spend months for years from bloggers like Tiffany of Don’t Waste the Crumbs and Stephanie from Six Figures Under, but I have never attempted it myself…until now.

Why and How To Design a No-Spend Challenge

Different people have different rules for the challenge. (Will they actually spend $0? or just not buy any “extras” that month?) To create our family no-spend month rules, we started by looking at our reasons for spending less:

The boys and I took a long road trip this summer and stayed in more hotels than we had planned on.

We are preparing to move across the country, and, as everyone knows, moving is expensive!

We have stockpiles of household/toiletry items (and groceries) and not a lot of storage space.

The next thing we looked at was a few bad spending habits that we (meaning I) have developed over the summer:

Buying random stuff on Amazon.

Buying fast food. Lots of fast food.

Grocery shopping without a list.

Ordering delivery from local restaurants because I’m too tired or too busy to cook.

Can you relate?

In my case, all of these bad habits stem from a lack of preparation and mindfulness as well as being very busy.

I decided to take a break from all the spending.

Laying Down the Rules

We got together as a family and discussed where we could cut spending for September. It’s a tricky month for us because we have a week-long camping vacation at the end of the month, which we’ve been planning since last year.

We also have a tradition of going to eat at a restaurant for “Pie Society Monday” any time my husband has a Monday holiday off work (which only happens two or three times per year).

And then there’s the out-of-state trip my husband is taking for a job interview. The fight was already paid for, and he’s staying with friends so there are no hotel costs, but the rental car will go on a credit card and there will, of course, be incidental expenses.

I almost let all of these things influence me into putting off our no-spend challenge, but then I remembered that it’s our challenge, and our rules, and that we should just get on with it. So we are.

The Rules

1. No spending on household items or toiletries
2. Minimal spending on groceries
3. No spending on Amazon
4. No spending on clothing
5. No spending on dining out
6. Using gift cards we already have doesn’t count as spending

Household: I checked at the end of August, and we have enough toothpaste, mouthwash, dental floss, laundry detergent, household cleaners, garage bags, lotions, soaps, baby wipes, toilet paper, and paper towels to last for several months. I also have about 5,000,000 samples of skin care and makeup products stashed all over the house.

The only household thing we don’t have a large supply of is disposable diapers. I was very tempted to stock up on those at the end of August, but we still had about 20 left in the emergency stash, there was no money left in the household budget, and we need to get back into the cloth diapering game after being on the road for so long!

Groceries: We have SO MUCH food in our pantry and freezer, it’s not even funny. We have more meat than we could eat in a month (we don’t eat meat daily), as well as frozen fruit, veggies, smoothie packs, and soup. In the pantry, we have dried beans, oatmeal, granola, quinoa, lots of canned veggies, tortillas, pasta, popcorn applesauce, and several bags of coffee and boxes of tea.

We also have a monthly CSA subscription where we get a bunch of fresh veggies and a little bit of fruit every week. For this challenge, we’ve decided to only buy dairy (yogurt and half-and-half), fresh fruit (because what we get from the CSA only lasts us about a day), and bread. No spending on processed foods!

I used to bake bread every week, but it’s a bit too much to ask right now with our oldest starting third grade (homeschooling), Babyman learning to walk, prepping for a big move, AND getting ready for fall craft show season. (Hashtag MAKEALLTHETHINGS). So we’re buying bread.

Amazon: I have nothing against Amazon in itself. The fact is, it’s too easy for me to overspend when I’m shopping online. It’s just too convenient, and I tend to rationalize purchases until “wants” look like “needs.”

Clothing: We have a baby, and baby clothes are just SO CUTE. It’s easy to buy too many baby clothes just because they’re adorable. Also, I’ve been losing weight and I’m not sure where a lot of my pre-pregnancy clothes are (somewhere in storage), so it’s easy to impulse-buy cheap, cute clothes for myself, too. (Thanks, Target.)

Dining out: We don’t go to restaurants very often, but now that we live in the big city, delivery services like DoorDash, GrubHub, and UberEats have made dining out a home a regular thing for us. A quick stop at a fast food restaurant has become way too regular for us, too. Dining out is an easy way to derail both our budget and our quest for healthier eating.

The Exceptions to the Rules

Babyman got sick and we ran out of probe covers for the thermometer (and it won’t work without the covers), so we did buy those ($12) but we had a $4 off coupon so that helped.

I will still be shopping on Amazon for business-related expenses. It’s the best value for my consumables, and if I were to go into a craft store or office supply store for those things, I’d probably leave with a cart full of impulse purchases!

I’ve actually been doing pretty well resisting those cute baby clothes for the past few months, and then Babyman had a growth spurt and was down to about four outfits that fit him. I planned to shop at Old Navy or Gap for him (and for a new shirt for my husband’s job interview) because I had a ton of reward dollars there from a special GapCard offer over the summer. Results: $125 worth of stuff (that was the total, after tax, on mostly clearance prices) for just over $4 on my GapCard (which I will now go pay off).

We decided to make an exception to the “no dining out” rule for Pie Society Monday because it’s a family tradition, it only happens a few times a year, and it doesn’t have to cost a whole lot anyway. There is also bound to be a bit of dining out when my husband is traveling, but he’s very frugal anyway and his $5 lunches are not the things that have been wrecking our budget over the summer. Also, we do have a few gift cards/rewards program points that he can redeem for free food. (See Rule #6)

How We’re Managing Vacation During a No-Spend Month

I don’t recommend doing your first no-spend month when you have a trip planned, but we decided to go ahead with it because we didn’t want to put off our financial fast once we decided to do it and because camping, as vacations go, is pretty inexpensive. Also, we paid for our site months ago and we don’t need any new camping gear to make it work. (I REALLY wanted a new, two-burner stove from REI’s big Labor Day Sale, but I resisted.) It’s basically just a get-in-the-car-and-go kind of trip.

We won’t need any groceries for the first few days we’re there, and we don’t eat much meat so our grocery budget can stay pretty low. The place we’re going is not new to us; we already know that groceries are VERY expensive within the state park but pretty reasonable in town, so we’ll spend about the same amount on groceries there as we would at home.

This is our 10-year anniversary trip (even though it’s our 11th anniversary), so I’m sure to buy a souvenir or two (coffee mugs and shirts are my go-tos). We’ve noticed that when we visit this particular state park, usually in September, the gift shops have a lot of stuff on clearance. Not something I would have expected from a state park gift shop, but it works out well for us!

We also have a tradition of buying ice cream at the general store near the campground at least once while we’re there, so we’ll just set a small budget for goodies and souvenirs during the trip (and stick to it).

Why We Aren’t Doing a Zero-Spend Month

Not dining out, eating what’s in the freezer, and saying no to impulse shopping is not the same as not spending ANY money, so why do it and why call it a challenge?

For us, it IS a challenge. We have a case of too much muchness over here. We have become so busy (between dealing with illness, restarting a business, and uncertainty about where we will be working and living in the future), that we have just stopped paying attention.

I’ve bought things (like new dining room chairs from IKEA) that, two weeks later, are still sitting in boxes, unopened. I’ve bought other things (like toothpaste and string cheese) just to find out that we already have more than we need of that exact item in the cupboard or freezer.

If you tend to be disorganized (like me) or have been overwhelmed by life changes such as a change in employment, having a baby, illness in your family, or moving (also like me), you have probably experienced similar things.

If not, good for you! If you want to do your own no-spend challenge, I’d love to hear about it! It’s like Stephanie over at Six Figures Under says: The rules are:

1. Make your own rules.
2. Follow the rules you make.

That’s it! Remember to track your progress and then reassess at the end of the month. What went well? What would you change next time? What were you able to do because of your no-spend month? Did you pay off some annoying debt? Did you save for a trip? Did you clear out some space in your freezer, pantry, or calendar? Did you have just enough instead of not enough? Let me know in the comments below!