Wednesday, April 2, 2008

First shopping trip.

We went on our first major shopping trip on Monday. Living in a small town in BC you have to go elsewhere when there is a need for some serious restocking of the shelves and this time we chose Spokane, Washington. How did we do avoiding Chinese products, well really well. It also helped that some of the kids would look at every product they were interested in and ask at the top of their lungs "is this made in China?" Kids can be so embarrassing at times as they are brutally honest. They really helped in our quest.

As you can imagine, almost every toy out there is made in China especially the lower end plastic products. We did manage to find some books for the girls that were made in North America, not that they need any more books but at least they got something. My wife found clothes that she was needing and although there were a lot of clothes made in China, there were a lot that weren't. Again we seemed to do really well at Old Navy where a majority of our dollars were spent.

Shoes. That is the tough category, could not find any summer shoes out there that weren't made in China. Flip Flops forget it. I looked at my runners that I bought a couple of years ago while I was in training, Mizuno brand, sound European doesn't it. Nope, made in China. So shoes will be the trouble spot. Oh yes, and hair clips.

There was one store we looked at in Spokane where every single product was from China, unfortunate because they had really nice stuff.

One point for the Chinese though. I won a bid for some microphones on ebay a few weeks ago and they arrived yesterday. Turns out they were made in China. We had to really look all over them to find a country of manufacture and it was hidden inside the shaft. Sneaky. I ordered those before we started this so I have to let it slide.

One week down. The unfortunate thing about the trip is the speeding ticket I got on the way back for going 35 in a 25 zone! I know some police officers here that would never write a ticket that lame. That ticket eliminated any possible savings for the day, if the ticket stands 'cause I'm gonna fight it.

2 comments:

Shelley said...

Bummer on the ticket! The flip flops stood out as if you read or listen to Me to We by Craig Kielberger, at the beginning of the book, they mention how brutal it is for children to make flip flops. I am listening to the Cd version and forget the details but not the feeling it left me, of how they get severely burnt etc. in dipping them in something. The book focuses on child labor issues and after hearing that, I will DEFINITELY watch where I get any flip flops from--having said that, i bought my 1st pair last year and broke my baby toe slipping on a log at the beach carrying baby, so i will just not wear them!

M&M said...

Sounds interesting... will have to check it out. I guess no flip flops for us either. We can always stick to "holey soles", they're canadian and have a little more support.