Stockpiling

Help, I feel like they’re going to call that TV show about hoarding on me!! Isn’t all this stockpiling for people who think the end of the world is coming?? I don’t want to become a crazy person. 

Stockpiling is not about hoarding or being crazy or fatalistic.  Stockpiling is about refusing to pay rent to the store. 

Look at it this way: 

If I buy paper towels at the rock bottom price of FREE and I only buy enough for 3 weeks --- and then during week 4 when I am out of paper towels, I go to the store and I pay $1.50 for a roll of paper towels to get me through ---- I have just paid the store rent for the shelf space for storing those paper towels for 3 weeks.  I’ve paid them $.50 a week rent on that shelf space for that one silly roll of paper towels.  I could have stored those same paper towels in my house on my own shelf for FREE – but no, I decided to pay the store rent. 

Now, personally, I am adverse to paying anything I don’t actually have to pay.  And rent on shelf space to a store that is already charging me for items drives me bananas.  Whenever possible, I buy at rock bottom prices.  And I buy the right amount so that I will not have to buy that item again until the rock-bottom price returns again.  My price book tells me when I can expect that to happen, so I can predict how much I need. 

So, I have some shelving in my house (how much shelving will depend on your family size and needs and on how often the rock bottom prices seem to come around on the items your family uses --- every family is a tiny bit different) I store my own non-perishables on my own shelves and I don’t pay rent to the store. 

My own house is a bit unusual in the storage department, so we have to get a little bit creative in the storage department.  Our house is over 200 years old, so there are NO closets, and the basement is not useable for storage (it is stacked stone with a dirt floor --- it cannot be made mouse-proof and it gets very musty during damp weather.  Anything I put down there either ends up chewed or moldy smelling)  We do have a small room that serves as a pantry.  We’ve lined it with shelving and cabinets and store food products there.  

We also have three small shelves in the main bathroom.  I’ve fitted them with bins that hold our toiletries stockpile.  Its all organized, looks pretty, doesn’t raise the eyebrows of guests and works pretty efficiently for us. 

In the half bath/laundry room, we have an old cabinet that stores the stockpile of laundry supplies, batteries, and odds and ends. 

Finally, at the top of the attic stairs (accessible, but not “right at hand”) we have some shelving and an old dog crate that store the paper goods (paper towels, toilet paper, Kleenex etc) of our stockpile.  That’s about it.  We don’t have some super jumbo set of shelving lining every wall of our house.  We have just what we need to stockpile efficiently and effectively for our household. 

We don’t hoard.  We don’t stockpile more than we need.  We don’t save things we don’t or won’t use.  We selectively plan for the future and store away what we know we will need so that we have it.  We don’t pay rent to the store for keeping items on their shelves.  They get enough of our money without paying them rent.