Food, Home and Style

Recession Concessions: Keeping My Coffee

Laura Yona, 36
Glen Rock, N.J.

Keeping: Starbucks ($5 per cup)
I used to commute into NYC before I got laid off from my management position at Tutor.com. The one real just-for-me splurge that I’ve kept since being laid off is Starbucks in the morning. I have cut back to 3-4 times a week instead of every day, but it’s still $15-20 a week on coffee. For me, though, a lot of it is about actually going to my local Starbucks. The people there know me and are super nice to me and chat with me about what I’m reading. They are really the only people I get to talk to these days that I’m not related to or talking to about my kids. I always walk out of there with a smile on my face—totally worth the $5 or so I’ve paid for the coffee. (I also justify a little because I get four shots, so I’m really paying $5 for four coffees…they’re just all served in the same cup, right?)

Ditching: Salads, manicures, sitters, yarn and more
After being informed that my position was one of 13 being eliminated at the end of October, the second phone call I made was to cancel my cleaning service (the first was to my husband). I figured that one of the few advantages of being home would be time to clean the house, so that was a no-brainer. I had confidence in myself despite the economy, so I didn’t make any other immediate cut-backs. I went to Starbucks every morning, got my bi-weekly mani-pedis, dropped the kids off at day care, bought my pre-made salads, and looked for a job. I did cut back on yarn purchases (I knit, and was spending an average of $100-$300/month on yarn, mostly to independent dyers) and clothing purchases, and had our second phone line turned off, but nothing too drastic.

As the weeks stretched into months it became clear that the economy was mightier than my resume. In December we cut the kids back to three days a week in day care and I had given up my salad habit. By January, I had cut my Starbucks visits down to the three days the kids are at day care and by February I had given up my mani-pedis. We’ve also given up the baby-sitter we employed twice a week so my husband could go to rugby practice, cut our meals out down from once or twice a week to once or twice a month, completely stopped buying yarn and clothes, stopped picking up impulse purchases for the kids, cut back drastically on our book purchases (like our dinners out, down from one or two a week to one or two a month). I’m also not renewing any of my magazine subscriptions until I find a steady paycheck, and let’s not forget the approximately $300 a month I was spending on my commute.

I feel guilty when I spend money on anything but groceries or gas, but I also feel guilty about not putting more money into the economy. With the cost of COBRA (my husband owns his own business, so we’re typically dependent on my employers for health insurance) and keeping the kids in day care (which I like for educational reasons and social skill building), my unemployment is gone as soon as it hits our bank account. I’m working on some independent projects—a book, a database for writers, self-publishing knitting patterns—which I’m hoping will eventually start paying off, but in the meantime, we just don’t have the extra money for the little luxuries.

What are you keeping and giving up in the recession? Email us, or discuss it in the comments section.

Tags: eating, Food, Home and Style, Recession Concessions, spending, The Unemployed Life