Speaker 1: De Influencing Summer.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to
Speaker 2: save money, embrace simplicity, and liver your life.
Speaker 1: Here your hosts Jen and Jill. Welcome to Frugal Friends.
Speaker 1: My name is Jen, my name is Jill, and today
Speaker 1: we are deinfluencing all of the viral trends of summer.
Speaker 3: This is one of my favorite little series we've been
Speaker 3: doing because we talk about being able to deinfluence ourselves.
Speaker 3: But in the past we've kind of talked about it
Speaker 3: in this theoretical kind of way about the things you're
Speaker 3: probably seeing, how marketers do things, and all of that
Speaker 3: is still true and accurate, but now we're actually digging
Speaker 3: in and showing examples of where we're seeing this on
Speaker 3: the internet, on social media, and it comes so glaringly
Speaker 3: acute to realize whoa this is everywhere when you kind
Speaker 3: of hear some of the compilations that we've done.
Speaker 1: So I'm excited to get into it. But first, this
Speaker 1: episode is brought to you by free things. Things that
Speaker 1: you don't have to spend money for, things that when
Speaker 1: you see marketing about them, it's not to pry money
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Speaker 3: All right, let's get into how we're deinfluencing some of
Speaker 3: the viral trends of something.
Speaker 1: We're looking at this from three categories. Uh So, first
Speaker 1: let's talk about the categories and why we picked them.
Speaker 1: So we're going to talk about stuff travel and sales
Speaker 1: could be on both, but between vacations, sales and just
Speaker 1: having more time to shop in general, Americans spent over
Speaker 1: two hundred billion dollars on summer in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 3: And that's a massive number that kind of makes us
Speaker 3: be like, okay, but how much of that am I
Speaker 3: responsible for? Most of us saw an increase of three
Speaker 3: and a half percent on our travel spending from twenty
Speaker 3: twenty three to twenty four and a one hundred percent
Speaker 3: jump compared to the pre pandemic levels in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 3: So we are traveling so much more than we did
Speaker 3: when I prepreb that a val it.
Speaker 1: When I saw the numbers on what people were spending
Speaker 1: on travel in twenty nineteen compared to twenty twenty four,
Speaker 1: it wasn't just one hundred percent. It's one hundred and
Speaker 1: eighteen percent jump, which is we're more than double on
Speaker 1: summer travel than we did it thet when it was
Speaker 1: at its height in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so maybe the three and a half percent is
Speaker 3: just keeping up with inflation, but the one hundred and
Speaker 3: eighteen percent increase from twenty nineteen to no.
Speaker 1: And so some of and social media is a big
Speaker 1: part of that. Retail was not left out behind. That's
Speaker 1: always a little less uh because people are compensating with
Speaker 1: their they're spending more on travel, so they cut back
Speaker 1: in retail, but still a two point three percent year
Speaker 1: of a year increase, and that is heavily driven by
Speaker 1: like more affordable things, lower cost things that are exacerbated
Speaker 1: by sales. Memorial Day, fourth of July Prime Day which
Speaker 1: is now an actual holiday, uh, and then back to school.
Speaker 1: So we are focusing on these three biggest leaks to
Speaker 1: your budget, travel, viral shopping trends, and summer sales. First up, vacations.
Speaker 2: We bought a vacation house in Mexico a few years
Speaker 2: ago that we try to come to as much as
Speaker 2: humanly possibles.
Speaker 4: If you want to be drinking April Spritz is on
Speaker 4: the Amalfi Coast this summer.
Speaker 1: I have the most insane travel deal. I can't gate
Speaker 1: keep this.
Speaker 3: This is one of the best family friendly vacation spots
Speaker 3: without having to leave the country.
Speaker 1: If you look for the perfect girl's vacation trip this year,
Speaker 1: then I've got just the place for you. You have
Speaker 1: Day four of our New England Summer vacation. I always
Speaker 1: talk about moving to Florida, and this is why I'm
Speaker 1: just on the beach. I have my burger here, beautiful.
Speaker 1: I just woke up at the beach house, and I
Speaker 1: want to show you guys, because it's my favorite place
Speaker 1: on earth, all right, So there is no shortage of
Speaker 1: inundation of people on social media telling you about the
Speaker 1: vacations they're on. Whether they're domestic or abroad, they're going
Speaker 1: to have the same basic setup. There's a beach, there's relaxation,
Speaker 1: there's ah, this is my favorite place in the world.
Speaker 1: I love it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And we are showing that that clip on YouTube,
Speaker 3: So if you want to kind of see the imagery
Speaker 3: along with it, definitely head over to our YouTube channel.
Speaker 3: But one of the things that stands out to me
Speaker 3: is you can hear what they're saying and be like, yeah,
Speaker 3: but what kinds of visuals are they giving with this?
Speaker 3: And all of it is pretty elaborate, very luxury, and
Speaker 3: so kind of giving this idea of this is the
Speaker 3: type of vacation that you should be having, and some
Speaker 3: of it is saying affordable, but we don't know to who,
Speaker 3: We don't know right now, and so then we can
Speaker 3: start to think like, this is what an affordable vacation
Speaker 3: should look like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's not taking into account variables like budgets and
Speaker 1: how many kids you have, and that a family vacation
Speaker 1: is not a vacation, it's a trip. It's work. You're
Speaker 1: still parenting, right, and you still like look at it
Speaker 1: and you're like, oh my gosh, Like if I was here,
Speaker 1: then maybe the trip wouldn't feel like work. Maybe you
Speaker 1: would feel like luxury. And that's just not the case.
Speaker 1: So for each of these trends that gets us to
Speaker 1: spend more money, we're going to talk about the cognitive
Speaker 1: biases in our brains that these social media videos target
Speaker 1: to get us to spend money we otherwise wouldn't have,
Speaker 1: or to up our spending in places that we do
Speaker 1: really want to spend and end up then over spending
Speaker 1: and regretting it. So the first one is the availability heuristic.
Speaker 1: So for this one in travel, the availability heuristic frequent
Speaker 1: exposure to travel destinations, whether it's fancy you know, Bali,
Speaker 1: Paris to Loom or even just like domestic beach places.
Speaker 1: It makes them feel more accessible even if they're far
Speaker 1: away or expensive. So even if they're not easily accessible
Speaker 1: via travel or budget. The more you see it, the
Speaker 1: more accessible it becomes to you. So sometimes on social
Speaker 1: media the availability heuristic is really good for us for
Speaker 1: inspirational content, especially in the financial world, we love to
Speaker 1: use this bias to just drown you with like debt
Speaker 1: payoff stories and budgeting hacks and successes and saving money.
Speaker 1: The more you see it, the more accessible it becomes.
Speaker 1: They use the same concept in travel to make these
Speaker 1: destinations feel more available.
Speaker 3: What's also happening here is something called projection bias, which
Speaker 3: is where we can imagine ourselves enjoying something more than
Speaker 3: we actually might, so overestimating how good it might actually
Speaker 3: end up feeling later, and this happens a lot, particularly
Speaker 3: with travel, and even other types of research can even
Speaker 3: indicate that we will often get more dope, I mean
Speaker 3: from the anticipation of the trip and how much enjoyment
Speaker 3: we get on the trip itself. So there's a lot
Speaker 3: of things at play here. But that's another draw that
Speaker 3: can happen is when we are really projecting how great
Speaker 3: that trip is going to be, and it's not helped
Speaker 3: by the fact that social media is encouraging you to
Speaker 3: think that life will be so much better if you
Speaker 3: book this.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Another one is nostalgia and escapism. Obviously, escapism is
Speaker 1: like textbook for travel content. Beautiful visuals and storytelling evoke
Speaker 1: a longing for either past travels, and we always have
Speaker 1: this like rose colored glasses when we're thinking about past travel.
Speaker 1: We don't remember the bad things, like how your toddler
Speaker 1: was crying in the middle of the night. I actually
Speaker 1: do remember those ones, but we don't remember like the
Speaker 1: things that stank. We only remember like the really great things.
Speaker 1: So it uses that and then making the experience feel
Speaker 1: more emotionally necessary. That's escapism. So travel contenters' contenters.
Speaker 5: It.
Speaker 1: Travel content creators will create stories around these destinations even
Speaker 1: when they don't necessarily exist. The stories, not the destinations,
Speaker 1: to make them feel like like a place that's going
Speaker 1: to solve your problems, Like you're not happy right now,
Speaker 1: and this place will make you happier, because that's what
Speaker 1: happened to me. I was unhappy and then I traveled
Speaker 1: to all these places. And it's not the end all
Speaker 1: be all. It's not going to solve every one of
Speaker 1: your problems, but it's going to solve probably eighty percent
Speaker 1: of them. Right, they're not being crazy when they're creating this,
Speaker 1: but they're being just outside of reality enough to make
Speaker 1: you believe it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, here's the thing. Most people are not going on
Speaker 3: lavish vacations. They are not spending an extreme amount of
Speaker 3: money every single summer. Ooh hawt Girl summer in Europe,
Speaker 3: ooh hawt Girl summer in Mexico, ooh Hawtgirl summer in.
Speaker 1: The Anlafee Coast. I have sixteen dollars in my bank account.
Speaker 1: It is Hot Girl Summer at Dollar Tree this year. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I would I would dare to say that it is
Speaker 1: mostly the content creators that are doing this, and it's
Speaker 1: the thing that we see it so much because it's
Speaker 1: their job, like it's their job to be either travel
Speaker 1: content creators or just like standard influencers, lifestyle influencers, and
Speaker 1: so they're taking these either small like these I don't know,
Speaker 1: I won't say small, but domestic trips. I saw some
Speaker 1: of these even in the mashup that we included clips
Speaker 1: were actually sponsored so they didn't have to pay for
Speaker 1: their stay. Otherwise they're doing it. A lot of it
Speaker 1: is a write off because they get to create content
Speaker 1: while on the trip, So it's not like most of
Speaker 1: us are not taking trips like this. I cannot tell
Speaker 1: you the last time I personally went to Europe. I
Speaker 1: don't remember. I think I was in college and that
Speaker 1: was a long time ago. So I love to do
Speaker 1: a little staycation. But yeah, like most people are not
Speaker 1: doing this, even though it looks like they are.
Speaker 3: Well, and even a lot of these influencers, for some
Speaker 3: of them, it's it's not even as regular as it
Speaker 3: might seem. We're just seeing so many influencers talking about this.
Speaker 3: But even if we do go to Europe, because I
Speaker 3: did actually last year and it was fantastic, but that's
Speaker 3: a once every five years type of vacation that we
Speaker 3: get to do. And so you know, if you were
Speaker 3: to be following my Instagram account alongside other people's, you
Speaker 3: might think, oh, this gets to happen all the time.
Speaker 3: But I think we're really trying to get de influence,
Speaker 3: bring us back down to normal life, and recognize we're
Speaker 3: not all doing this.
Speaker 1: All the time.
Speaker 3: So instead, be a tourist in your own city. Consider
Speaker 3: doing a SPA day at your local spa facility, Go
Speaker 3: to museums, get free passes from your library, go see
Speaker 3: a movie, go do some of the fun things that
Speaker 3: you don't do very regularly in your area as a
Speaker 3: way to really enjoy summer.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and if you do want to take a vacation,
Speaker 1: make it like a driveable staycation. I think back to
Speaker 1: when I'm thinking like nostalgia, I'm thinking back to trips
Speaker 1: when I was a kid, we never flew anywhere. We
Speaker 1: would always drive, and it was always like small. We
Speaker 1: would like stay in a nice hotel because we didn't
Speaker 1: have to drive, but even it wasn't like top notch
Speaker 1: for me, it was nice. It was probably like I
Speaker 1: don't know, like a best step above a Best Western
Speaker 1: or something. I was always thought it was like luxury
Speaker 1: because it wasn't my home. And your kids are thinking
Speaker 1: the same thing. It doesn't have We don't have to
Speaker 1: live on this like lifestyle inflation, you know, treadmill and
Speaker 1: just get better and better and better when we think
Speaker 1: about vacations, like we can do Europe, but like again,
Speaker 1: make it out every five to ten year thing. Start
Speaker 1: saving now, decide how decide where you want to go
Speaker 1: and how often you want to go, Like totally separate
Speaker 1: from what you're seeing on social media because most by
Speaker 1: the time it's on social media, it's probably oversaturated and
Speaker 1: not that great anyways. So yeah, I've never been to
Speaker 1: the Amalfi Coast, but I can only imagine how crowded
Speaker 1: it is in summer. So true. So moving on to
Speaker 1: viral trends.
Speaker 3: Ooh, this one gets a little bit juicy.
Speaker 1: This is my twelfth attempt trying to find the viral
Speaker 1: lobster beuted bad cookpreepants are going to be absolutely everywhere
Speaker 1: this summer. These are brand new summer arrivals from Target
Speaker 1: Perfect Turddak for the July and Ward. You want to
Speaker 1: stop smelling like crap and actually smell good this summer,
Speaker 1: this is the perfume you need.
Speaker 4: They're going to be the cool mom if you grab
Speaker 4: these sunglasses of this summer.
Speaker 2: By trending summer items to pick up right now, Besty Boom,
Speaker 2: I just created the perfect list of things that you
Speaker 2: need for Hockgirl summer.
Speaker 1: I'm not a gatekeeper, and these are things that I
Speaker 1: love that either make my life easier or make me
Speaker 1: feel cuter or both. Six reasons why this gedget is
Speaker 1: this summer's hottest product. You know, when we started outlining
Speaker 1: this episode, it was originally going to just be about
Speaker 1: the viral lobster beaded bags, because I was seeing all
Speaker 1: these people looking for these this specific lobster bag at
Speaker 1: TJ Max and Marshall's and they were like this woman
Speaker 1: who said she was on her twelfth store, she went further.
Speaker 1: I still think this was in April, and I still
Speaker 1: don't think she's found the lobster beat. I think she
Speaker 1: made it to like store eighteen, and she's like, like
Speaker 1: going to other stores, it's probably not even on trend anymore. No,
Speaker 1: I mean it's so that's the point, Like these viral
Speaker 1: trends are trends, and Lord only knows why anything goes viral,
Speaker 1: but these are all like you're going to be hearing
Speaker 1: so many like this is the must have of summer.
Speaker 1: These are like summer dress hall like this. And those
Speaker 1: viral beaded bags were not good looking. They did not
Speaker 1: look good. I made a mashup of just beaded bag
Speaker 1: TikTok's too, and it's not good. And these people at
Speaker 1: the end, one of these girls, and you couldn't hear it,
Speaker 1: Like she didn't say it out loud, it was just
Speaker 1: like a note on the video. She's like, I don't uh,
Speaker 1: I don't know if this is just like TJ Maax blindness,
Speaker 1: but this is so cute. And then on the video
Speaker 1: it said it was absolutely tjmax blindness. This is not cute.
Speaker 1: But that's how I see so many people I can like,
Speaker 1: I see so many people with these things that I've
Speaker 1: seen on TikTok and Instagram as trends, and they're not
Speaker 1: cute if you if you're not familiar that it's a
Speaker 1: trend on social media. I look at them and I'm like,
Speaker 1: why did why do you have that? What got you
Speaker 1: to buy a tiny shell bag that you have to
Speaker 1: carry the whole time. You can't put it on your arm,
Speaker 1: you can't put it down. It's gonna fall over, like
Speaker 1: if you open it, all your things are gonna fall out.
Speaker 1: But but here's the thing. I watched so many of
Speaker 1: these videos and by the end I was like, actually,
Speaker 1: the lime one's kind of cute. That happened to me too.
Speaker 1: With one of the I think they were seashells.
Speaker 3: And to hear me say it out loud, it is
Speaker 3: a little bit like what and it had these like
Speaker 3: it had like dangly fringe.
Speaker 1: My perception of what looked good, slowly shifted over time.
Speaker 1: It was wild. We were trying to debunk the thing
Speaker 1: and our minds were slowly getting roped into it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean bell bottoms, right, am I? Right? Do you own?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 1: But no? But you know what I might end because
Speaker 1: you just get worn down. That's the thing. Time when
Speaker 1: you see and your algorithm, if you watch something, it
Speaker 1: shows you more of it. Right, So if you see
Speaker 1: it over and over and over, you will just natch,
Speaker 1: really start to be attracted to it.
Speaker 3: So here's what's happening. There is a part of fomo
Speaker 3: going on here. That fear of missing out is alive
Speaker 3: and well and very real, and it's kind of what
Speaker 3: we're describing. Once you start to associate yourself with a
Speaker 3: certain group, you feel like you are like this person
Speaker 3: or the collection of people. This is what they're doing.
Speaker 3: Our sense of belonging kind of starts to take over
Speaker 3: our desire for connection, and we don't want to be
Speaker 3: on the outskirts of that. We want to be right
Speaker 3: there in it, feeling like we're.
Speaker 1: Riding the wave too. What you like? I like, we're
Speaker 1: having fun, we're all laughing together. So I'm getting a
Speaker 1: lobster bag, So I'm getting I'll add the bandwagon effect
Speaker 1: to that too. Yeah, that it's just we want to
Speaker 1: be connected to each other, right, and we watch for
Speaker 1: the people. And I think that was what I was
Speaker 1: seeing a lot of when I was looking at these trends,
Speaker 1: is that I was interested in the people more than
Speaker 1: the stuff, and then the interest in the stuff came
Speaker 1: as a result. And I saw so many people go
Speaker 1: in for these lobster bags that were very hard to find.
Speaker 1: They just went in because it was hard to find.
Speaker 1: They wanted to see if they could get it, they
Speaker 1: bought it. If they couldn't find it, they came out
Speaker 1: with other stuff or other beaded bags that were again
Speaker 1: not cute. So a lot of them, they feel like
Speaker 1: you're friends.
Speaker 3: It feels like you're coming along on a shopping trip
Speaker 3: with a friend, and don't we all just want that?
Speaker 1: And these women are so likable and relatable, and so
Speaker 1: you want to root for them and be part of
Speaker 1: that journey. So the next bias that this is playing
Speaker 1: into is social proof. So when a product has hundreds
Speaker 1: or thousands of glowing reviews, dupe tutorials, influencer messages, it
Speaker 1: signals that it's safe and smart to buy. And also
Speaker 1: the comment section. The comment section can be dangerous too.
Speaker 1: You're seeing just ordered mine, Oh my gosh, I love it,
Speaker 1: stuff like that. When you see that then and I'm
Speaker 1: thinking back to the fragrance video and the makeup video
Speaker 1: that was in the mashup, like you could just have
Speaker 1: not even used it, and you're just doing You're an
Speaker 1: influencer doing a video on it, and then people can
Speaker 1: come up in the comments and do the selling for you,
Speaker 1: and you like all of the people who like it,
Speaker 1: and anybody who doesn't like it, you kind of bury
Speaker 1: that comment, like that's how this thing works. That's how
Speaker 1: influencers get social proof on their videos. And we just
Speaker 1: cannot trust influencer social proof anymore because people are doing
Speaker 1: wing this for money, Like that's what all of this is.
Speaker 1: I don't know what the Marshals thing was. I think
Speaker 1: that was really just the fomo aspect of it, because
Speaker 1: you can't really monetize Marshals, but people with the target
Speaker 1: finds and all of the you know, the Capri pants
Speaker 1: you can link to your LTK to all kinds of
Speaker 1: capri pants, which I was shocked that Capri Pants left
Speaker 1: because I have long legs and like a lot of
Speaker 1: pants are just capris on me, and I was upset
Speaker 1: actually to know that they had left, but please to
Speaker 1: know that they've come back. They've never been my favorite,
Speaker 1: but all right, it's helpful if you're going to chew
Speaker 1: through whatever. Right, I never choose a capri pant, the
Speaker 1: capri pants choose me. They're not Yeah, they're not going
Speaker 1: to keep you warm, they're not going to keep they're
Speaker 1: not going to keep you cool. Who knows what they
Speaker 1: who knows what they do, but they're back for summer. Yeah.
Speaker 3: So there's also scarcity and urgency at play here, so
Speaker 3: only a few left and stuff or back in stock
Speaker 3: now or hurry, don't wait, limited edition, all of these
Speaker 3: things kind of make us feel like I've got to
Speaker 3: get it now.
Speaker 1: Particularly for me.
Speaker 3: I've noticed the back in stock thing always does get
Speaker 3: an initial like, oh wow, so it previously sold out. Well,
Speaker 3: then I'm probably gonna want it before it sells out again.
Speaker 3: Good to know that that's a marketing trick, so we
Speaker 3: can hold it hold out.
Speaker 1: So if you're seeing this, if you're experiencing these hold
Speaker 1: up trends, come and go. Hold up really could really
Speaker 1: look to see if it is the TJ Max blindness,
Speaker 1: like just pause before you buy. Like I saw a
Speaker 1: girl walking out of TJ Max with like waal art,
Speaker 1: and she had like twelve different beaded bags and she
Speaker 1: went in for one beaded bag. It was not the
Speaker 1: lobster bag, but after watching all the lobster bag videos,
Speaker 1: found the one she wanted and left with all this
Speaker 1: other stuff. So you just got to know it's not
Speaker 1: viral trends coming go.
Speaker 5: So when you go to the search page on TikTok,
Speaker 5: oftentimes they will suggest like viral items, and today the
Speaker 5: viral item is TJ Max viral lobster bag. I do
Speaker 5: feel like we are just kind of combining words and
Speaker 5: I'm hoping it sticks. Next up, we're gonna have the
Speaker 5: home depot of viral lasagna, the Zara a viral a
Speaker 5: laptop case, hometown buffet, viral grippy socks.
Speaker 1: I really believe that this. I really believe that the
Speaker 1: Zara laptop case could actually be a thing.
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm here think he's far off on that.
Speaker 3: I'm here for a hometown buffet grippy sock.
Speaker 1: You're just saying how many socks that people had given you.
Speaker 1: That's true. And you and but this is why I
Speaker 1: don't want them. I just want them to exist, hometown buffet.
Speaker 1: So here's what to do instead, it's gonna happen. Okay,
Speaker 1: turn off your phone, Go touch go touch grass, Go
Speaker 1: ground yourself in nature. That's I mean. Honestly, when we
Speaker 1: are oversaturating our brains with the same images over and
Speaker 1: over and over, we begin to believe with the voices
Speaker 1: behind those images are saying it just happens like it's natural.
Speaker 1: Our brains will do it. The more we hear it,
Speaker 1: the more we believe it. And that's a that's another
Speaker 1: cognitive bias that I forget the name of, but it's
Speaker 1: a confirmation bias. Yeah, so you have to turn it off.
Speaker 1: And that doesn't mean social media is bad. It doesn't
Speaker 1: mean you need to fast from social media or give
Speaker 1: up or anything. It just means that you need to
Speaker 1: like take a break and like, you know, kind of
Speaker 1: open your eyes from each your TJ max blindness, step.
Speaker 3: Away, allow yourself to recalibrate and experience reality.
Speaker 1: All right.
Speaker 3: The third one is flash sales. These are gonna be
Speaker 3: happening all summer. You're gonna hear messages like this.
Speaker 1: Sharing some of my favorite Amazon Prime Day deals. That
Speaker 1: Happy Prime Day to those who celebrate.
Speaker 4: There is literally only one thing you buy up the
Speaker 4: Prime Day sale.
Speaker 1: This should be Amazon Prime Day. Here's everything you need
Speaker 1: you related lightning round of things on sale for Prime Day.
Speaker 1: Amazon Prime Day is coming up this Tuesday Wednesday. But
Speaker 1: obviously I'm biased. I think my amazon'st references the best.
Speaker 1: Do not check out on Amazon for Prime Day yet
Speaker 1: until you watch this. Happy Amazon Prime Day. One of
Speaker 1: the best days of the year. Copy Prime Day. This
Speaker 1: is my favorite time of the whole entire year. I
Speaker 1: look forward to these next two days.
Speaker 3: It is a little nauseating to see it all accumulated
Speaker 3: like that, like stacked on top of itself. To realize
Speaker 3: how many people are out there, some of it with
Speaker 3: images of just tons of boxes and bags in the background.
Speaker 1: Just the consumption. And again it is not people don't
Speaker 1: expect you to go on these crazy hauls like they do.
Speaker 1: They understand that, you know, they're an influencer. It's kind
Speaker 1: of like it's just twenty percent, like outside of reality. Again,
Speaker 1: so they're usually saying like these are all the things
Speaker 1: that I have and I love that are on sale
Speaker 1: for Prime Day. I saw that over and over and over.
Speaker 1: Another thing I saw was like them saying deals like
Speaker 1: very quickly. That's another thing, like when people are throwing
Speaker 1: things that you very quickly, your brain, the decision making
Speaker 1: part of your brain, can't properly process, and so you
Speaker 1: start to think, like you immediately start to think that
Speaker 1: you need this, and your brain doesn't have enough time
Speaker 1: to tell you you don't, so you can kind of
Speaker 1: like accidentally make purchases.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we are following victim to the these sales everywhere again
Speaker 3: in part because of urgency bias, like this is only
Speaker 3: on sale for a limited time only, run don't walk,
Speaker 3: last chance, and it kind of elicits this fight or
Speaker 3: flight response, like I gotta do something about this because
Speaker 3: I'm feeling stressed. Might as well do it, and whatever.
Speaker 3: If I don't need it, then I'll just take it
Speaker 3: back later.
Speaker 1: But right I can just return it. And like, how
Speaker 1: many times do you get something on Amazon and you're like,
Speaker 1: I'll just return it and then you don't. That happens
Speaker 1: to me at least once a year.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I am here for returning things. But if
Speaker 3: that's always the fallback, then that's not taking into account
Speaker 3: all of the added cost of that on the environment,
Speaker 3: on our communities to be having things shipped to our door,
Speaker 3: picked up from our door, taken back to facilities, thrown
Speaker 3: in the trash like there's a lot of there's extra
Speaker 3: cost to returning.
Speaker 1: Not to mention, Amazon scheduled it's annual book sale the
Speaker 1: same weekend as Indie Books Store Day, and they would
Speaker 1: not apologize for it or even acknowledge that's what they did.
Speaker 1: They could have done their book sale at literally any
Speaker 1: weekend of the year, fifty one weekends to choose from,
Speaker 1: and they did it on Indie Bookstore Day's great. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so it's not even like a question of should I
Speaker 1: buy all, you know, these clothes, and it's not just
Speaker 1: Prime Day. I wanted to do a mashup of the
Speaker 1: same quote unquote holiday just as so you could see.
Speaker 1: But it's Memorial Day, it's fourth of July, it's back
Speaker 1: to school. You're going to get the same things for
Speaker 1: every holiday. It doesn't it doesn't matter the holiday. And
Speaker 1: they're playing on not just urgency but also like hyperbolic
Speaker 1: discount framing. This was a new one for me, but
Speaker 1: essentially videos that are exaggerating the savings, so like I've
Speaker 1: got five one hundred dollars in my cart for under
Speaker 1: two hundred, and they're going to just say, like how
Speaker 1: much they're getting for so little using these manipulative practices
Speaker 1: to like get you to spend more. And Amazon's affiliate
Speaker 1: program isn't even great. The affiliate program for places like
Speaker 1: Amazon target all these retailers that do these sales, they
Speaker 1: are not great. So I don't know why people put
Speaker 1: so much effort into getting you to buy stuff like
Speaker 1: this unless they're getting flat fee paid, you know, And
Speaker 1: then they're also poorly disclosing the companies that are paying
Speaker 1: them to promote Like that last one that said that
Speaker 1: it was her favorite time of the year was actually
Speaker 1: sitting in front of like twenty boxes and bags at
Speaker 1: Amazon her and it was not disclosed that it was
Speaker 1: a paid at but she was paid in product that
Speaker 1: per the FTC that should have been disclosed, right.
Speaker 3: And finally, another thing that can be happening here is
Speaker 3: narrative bias. So anytime an influencer is using storytelling to
Speaker 3: kind of rope us in, you might hear phrases like
Speaker 3: I've waited three years to get this vacuum, or I
Speaker 3: regretted missing last year's sale and so now and attaching
Speaker 3: story to kind of draw you in and make you
Speaker 3: believe Okay, yeah, I don't want to make the same
Speaker 3: mistake as them, or I want to have the same
Speaker 3: type of experience. So these are the types of things
Speaker 3: that we can be keeping in mind. These types of
Speaker 3: biases that would cause us to purchase is what can
Speaker 3: help us to deinfluence ourselves to know here's what's actually happening,
Speaker 3: and then be able to discern do.
Speaker 1: I actually want to buy this?
Speaker 3: Okay, I recognize this bias is happening, but do I
Speaker 3: I still want it? Or no, no, thank you, I'm
Speaker 3: not gonna give in to whatever bia.
Speaker 1: Yeah, all the people who are trying to like present
Speaker 1: this authority, you know, we've got the authority bias. But
Speaker 1: that's also the narrative bias, where it's like I've been
Speaker 1: using this stuff and I love it, and this is
Speaker 1: the stuff that I love that's on sale for Prime Day.
Speaker 1: Like that's all bringing you into a narrative. It's also
Speaker 1: bringing you into believing their authority, but you honestly cannot
Speaker 1: trust that the story or the authority is actually true
Speaker 1: or it's manufactured to make money. Time and time again,
Speaker 1: we find that influencers are lying to you to get
Speaker 1: you to buy stuff. We did a whole episode on it,
Speaker 1: we'll link to it up here. And we just cannot
Speaker 1: trust people that we don't actually know, and so we
Speaker 1: should do this for every sale, but especially Prime Day.
Speaker 1: And you have to be a Prime member to participate
Speaker 1: in Prime Day, So we just want to give you
Speaker 1: a little extra encouragement to not participate or not have Prime. Okay,
Speaker 1: I get it, But here's the thing.
Speaker 2: Amazon may thirty seven billion dollars just last year from
Speaker 2: Prime memberships alone. That's a lot of money, and yet
Speaker 2: most of us aren't even getting the two day delivery
Speaker 2: promise that we signed up for. That's why I signed
Speaker 2: up for Amazon Prime guarantee my two day delivery. And
Speaker 2: at this point it feels like less of a convenience
Speaker 2: and more of a habit, and I want to shop
Speaker 2: with intention.
Speaker 1: Shopping with intention, Amazon Prime is no longer a convenience.
Speaker 1: It is a habit, and that is what it was
Speaker 1: designed to be. Amazon may make a lot of money
Speaker 1: on Amazon Prime memberships, but it doesn't recoup the cost
Speaker 1: of what they it's a lost leader. What they get
Speaker 1: more more money in is your habit of shopping because
Speaker 1: you have Prime.
Speaker 3: So here's the solution. It is shopping with intentionality. It's
Speaker 3: also only taking advantage of sales when you actually need
Speaker 3: that item. Of course this can intersect with wanting it too,
Speaker 3: but when there's been thought about it, when you know
Speaker 3: that this is something that's going to solve a problem
Speaker 3: that you've been desiring for a long time. But also
Speaker 3: recognizing that nothing is a must have other than food, shelter, clothing.
Speaker 1: Nothing you can get on Prime Day is a must have.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and recognizing that half of these influencers who are
Speaker 3: trying to sell you things are actually going to be
Speaker 3: returning whatever it is that they bought, or they got
Speaker 3: it for free, or they're not expecting you to buy
Speaker 3: all of the things.
Speaker 1: So keeping this in mind can be part of the solution. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we just hope that summer is an en joyable season
Speaker 1: for you, not one that you regret later, not one
Speaker 1: that becomes a stressor or one that leaves you feeling
Speaker 1: less than. Anybody that makes you feel less than the amazing,
Speaker 1: unique person you are is trying to sell you something,
Speaker 1: and so We just want you to take all of
Speaker 1: this and have the best summer that you can and
Speaker 1: not feel manipulated into spending money that you don't need
Speaker 1: to to have a really full life.
Speaker 3: Do you know what else is amazing and unique and
Speaker 3: inspiring and never makes me feel less?
Speaker 1: Then? Oh, I do the villa the week.
Speaker 2: That's right, it's time for the best minute of your
Speaker 2: entire week.
Speaker 1: Maybe a baby was born and his name is William.
Speaker 2: Maybe you've paid off your mortgage, maybe your car died
Speaker 2: and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore.
Speaker 5: That's bills, Buffalo bills, bill clan, this is the bill
Speaker 5: up the week.
Speaker 4: Hey ladies, I have been watching you guys for quite
Speaker 4: a while and I have to give you my bills
Speaker 4: of the week. And oh my goodness, So I've been
Speaker 4: paying on my cable bill. We've had the same cable
Speaker 4: plan for I want to say, over almost ten years now,
Speaker 4: and we've been paying to sixty one every six months.
Speaker 4: Every year I would literally call them get the bill
Speaker 4: to go down, and then the bill will creep right
Speaker 4: back up. So I decided this month we were going
Speaker 4: to cut off TV services because we can use streaming
Speaker 4: right guess what that saved us one hundred and sixty
Speaker 4: one dollars. We are now only paying ninety five dollars
Speaker 4: for internet, So I am so motivated to go ahead
Speaker 4: and now see where where else I can say on bills.
Speaker 4: But I love listening to you guys every single week.
Speaker 4: I pre ordered and received your book already. And yeah,
Speaker 4: my name is Davy. Bye, yay, Davy.
Speaker 1: That's so great. That is significant, so significant. What you
Speaker 1: can do with one hundred and sixty.
Speaker 3: One dollars a month is wild. This was actually one
Speaker 3: of our weekly money Moves recently, was to cancel something.
Speaker 3: If you're following us on Instagram at Weekly Money Move,
Speaker 3: if you're getting our front letter every Monday, we talk
Speaker 3: about our money move. We talk about it in the
Speaker 3: Sunday Reset so Forrual Friends podcast on YouTube, and this
Speaker 3: is the type of thing that we are talking about.
Speaker 3: When it comes to canceling something, it's getting creative and
Speaker 3: finding an alternative for that item. So it wasn't you
Speaker 3: depriving yourself, it's you recognizing there are other ways to
Speaker 3: entertain myself. And I can get one hundred and sixty
Speaker 3: one dollars back into my hocket after over ten years
Speaker 3: of something that sounds like it was just on autopilot.
Speaker 1: Maybe it was a bit habitual.
Speaker 3: Maybe you thought, ah, I'm afraid of missing out on
Speaker 3: whatever this could mean, and I don't want to go
Speaker 3: through the hassle of it. But you finally did it
Speaker 3: and you freed up some significant cash. So well done, Davy.
Speaker 3: We're so excited about this one. If you have a
Speaker 3: bill that you want to share with us, if it
Speaker 3: has to do with canceling a bill or saving them bills,
Speaker 3: or a bill that you don't mind paying, you know
Speaker 3: the drill Frugal friendspodcast dot com slash bill.
Speaker 1: We can't wait to hear it. And now it's time
Speaker 1: for the lightning round shoot. Okay, what's a summer trend
Speaker 1: that you think is all hype? I love your answer
Speaker 1: here because I have a hot I just disagree. Uh
Speaker 1: but okay for me, this is I guess year round,
Speaker 1: but definitely seasonal decore. I just realize I don't. I
Speaker 1: don't think it's necessary. Jill, how much decore do you
Speaker 1: have in your house?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 3: I don't, And that's that's why I think it's overrated.
Speaker 1: Like an all high Yeah, seasonal or non season.
Speaker 3: But I do see it as I and might be
Speaker 3: one of those kind of i'll put it out there
Speaker 3: trends or things people feel almost like obligated to do.
Speaker 3: I know people who are like got to take down
Speaker 3: the spring stuff and put up the summer stuff, got
Speaker 3: to take down the summer.
Speaker 1: Stuff and put up the fall stuff.
Speaker 3: Like in addition to changing out your wardrobe from from
Speaker 3: spring to summer, and in addition to figuring out all
Speaker 3: of your activities and still doing your meal plans, like
Speaker 3: to add the additional weight of I've got to make
Speaker 3: sure like my household decor and plants and everything are.
Speaker 1: Like up to date. I just think that's an unreach.
Speaker 1: That's another social media like fallacy that everyone's changing out
Speaker 1: their seasonal wreath and their seasonal door foot scraper and
Speaker 1: all their garland and their candles and everything. That's not
Speaker 1: what normal people do. It's not they were not doing it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you don't go outside and touch grass, Go touch grass? Okay,
Speaker 1: what's yours? John Mine's water parks? I always thought that
Speaker 1: water theme parks are overrated. It smells, it's yucky, you
Speaker 1: have to buy special shoes for it, and it's scary.
Speaker 1: Every ride is scary. You cannot buckle into any of
Speaker 1: the rides. They are all scary. Okay, you really you
Speaker 1: were locked and loaded on that one. I knew it.
Speaker 1: I love water parks. They are so scary scary.
Speaker 3: I will do a water park one hundred times over
Speaker 3: before I do an amusement park like roller coaster rides.
Speaker 1: No, I can buckle into a roller coaster ride. You
Speaker 1: cannot buckle in sliding into a toilet bowl style oh,
Speaker 1: I love them, and then going fluh me down, baby,
Speaker 1: flush me down. I am not a poo. Give me
Speaker 1: had bike adventure, drop me off at the power of terror.
Speaker 1: Give me a seat belt, my lord. I think I
Speaker 1: hate water fun Okay, I always had the beach because
Speaker 1: I hate sand. But the beach is not overrated, is
Speaker 1: not hype. Yeah, I just don't like sand. Water parks
Speaker 1: are scary, yucky.
Speaker 3: I have gone to a water park for like a
Speaker 3: good amount of my birthdays.
Speaker 1: My birthday is in August. Uh, and I love water
Speaker 1: parks so much. And I'm so sorry that you're not
Speaker 1: gonna end up coming with me. Nope, nope. Well thanks
Speaker 1: everyone for listening. Uh.
Speaker 3: I feel free to share, whether or not you're a
Speaker 3: you're a water parker, roller coaster kind of person.
Speaker 1: Uh where will you share that with us? On Instagram?
Speaker 1: You know what? Follow us on Instagram? Tell us no
Speaker 1: on YouTube. I don't really care. Figure it out. She
Speaker 1: does care. Please please subscribe to our YouTube channel.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, yeah, tell us on YouTube this episode if
Speaker 3: you're watching it on YouTube.
Speaker 1: Anyways. We love we love reading your kind reviews.
Speaker 3: Here's something else we really like that Jen and I
Speaker 3: are not split on We both enjoy this same your
Speaker 3: reviews of our book, like this one from Britney Condas
Speaker 3: Happens to Be five stars. A great book for those
Speaker 3: interested in personal finance. This book is a solid ten
Speaker 3: out of ten. Jen and Jill are incredible and help
Speaker 3: make sense of how to spend and save in a
Speaker 3: way that each person can feel good out values based
Speaker 3: spending and what they are preaching through this book is
Speaker 3: all about aligning your spending with your beliefs, goals, and
Speaker 3: priorities and spending less on impulse or because of predatory
Speaker 3: marketing tactics. Reading the book and listening to the podcast
Speaker 3: has helped me to stay the course on my debt
Speaker 3: payoff journey and has honestly just opened my eyes to
Speaker 3: a whole new way of thinking. I am so very
Speaker 3: grateful for finding their content. If you are reading this review,
Speaker 3: I hope that you take a leap of faith to
Speaker 3: purchase because it could change your life too.
Speaker 1: Brittany. Yeah, thanks you, Britney. Yes, if you have read
Speaker 1: the book and you have not left a review yet,
Speaker 1: we would so appreciate if you would do that over
Speaker 1: on Amazon, even if you didn't buy it on Amazon,
Speaker 1: and we are totally okay if you don't, but people
Speaker 1: do use it as a catalog. And if you haven't
Speaker 1: left rating a review for the show, then we would
Speaker 1: love if you could do that on Spotify And we'll
Speaker 1: see you next time. Bye. Google Friends is produced by
Speaker 1: Eric Sirianni. Tonight is Kai's kindergarten transition night, and he
Speaker 1: will be singing a song with his class that goes
Speaker 1: a little something like this. There was a great, big moose.
Speaker 1: He liked to drink a lot of juice. His name
Speaker 1: was Fred. He liked to drink his juice in bed.
Speaker 1: And then there's more to the song, but it's copyrighted.
Speaker 1: Sing that somebody gonna try to use my clip profit
Speaker 1: off of it without knowledge. It's gonna be so cute
Speaker 1: and I am so prepared to break down into tears.
Speaker 1: So he's this is like graduation. Yeah, it's instead of
Speaker 1: doing like a kindergarten graduation. I think they just do
Speaker 1: this transition night. Okay, so all the classes will do
Speaker 1: a song. The first grade teachers come and prepare you
Speaker 1: for you know, what to expect next year. So same school. Like,
Speaker 1: he's not moving right, and I'm fully prepared to sob
Speaker 1: because I sobbed at the preschool graduation. I was gonna say.
Speaker 3: At this life stage, it's kind of like every year
Speaker 3: there's some sort of very monumental milestone practically until you
Speaker 3: get to high school graduation. But it's like, yeah, he
Speaker 3: wasn't a cap and gown this time last year. I yeah,
Speaker 3: I named a cap and gown this year.
Speaker 1: No, they do get special shirts. Oh my god, I'm
Speaker 1: I'm losing it now just thinking about it. Oh I can't,
Speaker 1: I can't. I'm obsessed. Him getting older is a good thing.
Speaker 1: It's so good. I love him so much. I love
Speaker 1: him so much. He's gonna have such a fun boy summer.
Speaker 1: It's such a fun boy summer.