It’s been awhile since I’ve had the motivation to post anything on here, but I’m making a comeback. I’ve got some (in my opinion) crazy awesome ideas for useful webapps or general software, but first, some background info:
I want to make a personal inventory system to keep track of all of my crap. I just bought some new Choco sandals for $80 – those things are known to last years. The guy that sold them to me had his for 13 years and repaired them only occasionally with some shoe glue. Now this is the first time I’ve spent that much money on footware, normally I would go spend $10 at Walmart for flip flops, which is what I did last summer, and they broke less than a year later. But let’s assume these Choco’s last me 10 years. That makes them just $8 a year – and these are NICE. They are comfortable and great for hiking. After 10 years, the Walmart flip flops will have cost $100 assuming they break every year like this year, and then they are not as nice to begin with. Oh yeah, one more thing – think of all the time and gas money it would take to have to go to the store to get more flip flops every year. Unless you love shopping, which I hate, it’s pretty much to your advantage, as well as the environment’s, to get something that’s going to last as long as possible. It used to be that lasting long was something that was looked for when we bought things perhaps 40 years ago, but now, Walmart has changed this. Now you are seen as being wealthy and loose with your wallet if you buy quality items instead of going to Walmart. Why can’t we learn to invest in the long-term when we make purchases nowadays? I think this should change, in order to increase our own quality of life and address the social and environmental problems that are occurring in the world.
With that said, I think that for me, the main reason that I don’t think about making things last as long as possible is that I forget about things quickly. I’ve got a busy life – I’m in college. I don’t have time to keep track of my crap, to research everything before I buy it, and to do a cost-benefit analysis of stuff before I buy. What I want to do is create a personal inventory system that is aimed at helping people make their personal items last as long as possible and get their money’s worth out of them. Maybe something like this already exists. If it does, please show me! But I want the system to be simple: just input items that you buy and expect to last longer than… let’s say six months. You will input the date of purchase, the place you bought it from, the price, and the target amount of time that it’s supposed to last. Then, you will know what you have, how much it’s worth, and if your small investments in simple objects are paying off or if they are ripping you off. This will also help people to know when it’s worth it to repair an item and when it’s worth it to buy a new one.
What do you think?
