Cut Back On Online Spending with a Brick-and-Mortar Diet

If you want to cut down on your impulse shopping habits, avoiding online stores and apps can help. Ditch the apps and start shopping at brick-and-mortar stores to cut down on buying the stuff you don’t need.

It’s easy to spend too much money when you’re shopping online. You don’t have to leave the house, and you can use a credit card and make payments on the stuff you buy. And thanks to emails, app pop-ups, and other digital reminders, those impulse sales and purchases are right in front of your face all the time—instead of just when you’re walking by them in the store.

You’ll Have Time to Change Your Mind

When you order online, it’s so easy to hit “buy” and have your credit card info already saved. When you have to go to the store to buy the things you want, you might need to wait a couple of days until you have time between work and life. In that time frame, you might decide you don’t need that thing anymore.

Plus, if you’re writing a shopping list for the store over a period of time, you can change your mind about items on the list before you even get in the car. Maybe you don’t need that set of cheese knives, after all, and can cross them off the list.

You Get a Hands-On Shopping Experience

Once you have a cart full of stuff at the store, you can look back over everything inside and pick out any impulse items. You get to try on clothing before you buy it, so you know it fits. Then you don’t have to wait for online returns to make it through the mail and be processed before getting your money back.

For some people, it’s easier to determine whether you need an item if you hold onto it, look it over, and maybe lug it through the store while you’re filling your cart with the items that are actually on your shopping list. Before you check out, you can look back at the items in your online shopping cart before you complete your purchase, but you can’t hold them in your hands and see if they really spark an interest.

You Get Actual Instant Gratification

And hey, if you need a little nudge to try the brick-and-mortar shopping diet, think about the instant gratification. Sure, buying online feels instant because you can click and buy anything you want at any time, but you still have to wait for the thing to arrive.

When you buy what you need from a brick-and-mortar shop, you get what you want right away—it’s instant gratification. You might spend a little bit more than the online bargains allow, but you don’t have to wait for the things you want to be shipped to you.