What is something you SHOULD cheap out on?

Weddings.
Yes, It IS a big day. It's not such a big day that you spend your entire life savings, and have no future.
Get a DJ, get a cake, get a hall, get a photographer.......forget the doves, forget the ice sculptures, forget the wedding planner, forget the genocidial mimes, forget the big limo, keep it small. Do you really need to invite your great aunt, who you've seen 3 times in your life?
You should NOT be spending like $20,000 on a wedding.
- The genocidal mimes are non negotiable
  
  I know right...we HAVE to have standards
  
  out of the loop, what are genocidal mimes?
- $20k?
  Damn dude, all my friends getting married are spending a minimum of $50k. $15k gets you the venue for the night without anything else included or factored in (food, music, fucking chairs or tables or lights, etc)
  Weddings are a predatory business.
  
  I can get a venue for like $200. What are you guys renting??? The Royal Palace???
  
  It varies a LOT regionally.
  Look for a venue in Maryland, you know, with DC right there.
  I have a friend who's entire wedding was the same price as a venue in Maryland.
  
  We got out cheap at about $25… we had a smaller (100 person) wedding, went budget on the food, had a DJ, cake, etc. (basically just what the OP said), and we were still hand crafting stuff to reduce the cost. Shit is fucking expensive.
- A friend of mine donned his nicest clothes and went down to the courthouse with his fiance and a couple of witnesses. I mentioned this to my sister, and she mentioned that in retrospect, she wished she'd done something similar when she got married.
  
  Did the same, then went out for a nice meal, weddings are a complete waste of money.
- Spent less than 1k, no real honeymoon...but we bought our first house with the money we saved. 0 regrets.
  
  This. This right here.
  Couple goals.
- My brother's father-in-law had offered to pay up to $15,000 for his daughter's wedding. He gave them the option of taking it all in cash and then getting a courthouse wedding so they could have a nest egg to grow, or spend it all on the wedding of his fiancée's dreams, or anywhere in between.
  She opted to spend it all on the wedding. 😒 My gawd did that piss me off.
- I laugh when I hear some couple spent $20k on their wedding but can’t buy a house. Dude, that could have been your down payment wtf.
  
  I mean...yes and no. A down payment for a single family home in today's market is many orders of magnitude more expensive than $20k. But I agree that weddings are too expensive. Just have a small party and use that money elsewhere.
- I'm in agreement except for the wedding planner. Whether they help with the planning from day one or are just the day-of coordinator, a good wedding planner is worth their weight in gold. I'd rather plug an old mp3 player into a portable speaker and skip the DJ before I recommend skipping out on the planner.
  
  Oh, by DJ, yeah, thats all he'd be doing is controlling the winamp playlist basically.
  And a wedding planner I don't see as being needed.
  Step 1) rent local venue.
  Step 2) ask cousin to be DJ.
  Step 3) pick up cake from dairy queen.
  Step 4) Flowers??? I'm sure the florist can figure something out.
  Thats about it.
- Don't take a loan either.
- Our wedding was under 5k, excluding dress and suit. Immediate family and close friends only, less than 40 people. Major expenses were the photographer, food and booze. We rented a cheap, small place in the countryside, we planned and did everything else ourselves, having a kanban board in the kitchen for a year was fun! My wife even did the cakes herself because she's an amazing amateur pastry chef. No DJ, but I spent months on and off curating a playlist with a good flow and steadily increasing intensity.
  It was the perfect wedding. Huge amount of work but 100% worth it.
- We spent less than 10k on our wedding and only invited close family. Did most of it ourselves. It was the best day ever!
- Go, and preach this gospel to SE asian families, I beg you.
  Getting away with a wedding for under 80k sometimes is considered "cheap" by those standards. And you absolutely must invite your third cousin once removed and your nextdoor neighbor who you hate. You see him every day afterall!
- Here's my pro tip.
  You want a unique picturesque wedding on a budget?
  National Parks in the US. If you keep your guest list under 50 people, you can get married anywhere in the park, provided you don't block access, put up decorations, or damage the park, and it's free! If you have more than 50 people, you need a permit, and those are raffled off per day, and almost no one uses them.
  I got married on the bluffs overlooking Little Hunter's Beach in Acadia National Park. The drive, food, and lodging for my wedding there cost less than the first payment for the venue of my "local" ceremony in my home city, which we ended up canceling anyway.
  
  If you do get a permit, are you allowed to put up decorations?
- Absolutely! Making it memorable and fun does not mean making it expensive. Cut whatever you can't afford, do not take out a loan to cover anything. Then cut anything that isn't meaningful to you and your partner.
  A wedding planner is helpful if you don't have a trusted and naturally organized friend who volunteers to handle details for you.
  I'd also recommend taking a local honeymoon.
- My wife and I spent $350 altogether for the paperwork and an officiant. We eloped beneath a tree in a park with her family present, and afterward I returned my dress shirt to Walmart for a refund. I will never regret how low-class that was.
  We've been married now for ten years.
- We bought a house, had the wedding in backyard for $10K, we put it all on credit cards for the sign up bonuses and had a 2 week honeymoon to Europe staying in 5 star hotels and first class flights all for $1,300 in signup fees.
- Use that money for a honeymoon instead.
- Mine cost $150. $70 for the license and $80 for the JP to do their thing.
  
  I'm sure JP stands for something reasonable, and that makes sense, but my mind struggles against itself, and all I can imagine is it stands for "Japanese" and also my brain things "Jurassic Park".
  So even though I'm 100% confident that this DIDN'T happen, I'm just imagining your wedding, with people sitting down, waiting for the bride to walk the isle......meanwhile, over by the other side of the room are bunch of Japanese cosplayers all recreating scenes from Jurassic Park. Complete with inflatable dinosaurs and .wav files of dinosaur sounds.
  All the while your guest list is like "WTF is even happening over there???"
  I'm sorry. I don't know what ACTUALLY happened at your wedding, but it would have been a HUGE upgrade if you had dinosaur fights, and Japanese cosplayers.

If you're not a contractor, power tools. Buy the harbor freight version first when you need it. If you end up using it enough to break it, then you get a quality one.
- I have never broken a 10 mm wrench, but I have lost a few. So I bought a ten pack on Amazon.
  
  nice, you're good for 6 months
  
  It's always the 10!
  I keep one in my center console, my keychain, and random cheapies mixed in around loose tools, on top of whatever is part of the sets. Periodically we'll still have a hard time finding one when its needed and have to replenish.
  Are they hanging out with the lost socks?
- Sorry, but this only applies to drills and sanding machines. Maybe a bench grinder also you can cheap out on. Hand tools are fine to cheap out on also.
  Circular saw, table saws, miter saws, angle grinders, etc..
  Any spinning blade, if you cheap out, don't be surprised if you get life-alteringly injured when you "use it enough to break it". I was just helping some friends renovate where they had a dirt cheap miter saw and it was just about the most dangerous experience of my life.
  If you are doing any big renovations, at least get makita, Milwaukee, or dewalt. You can get a TON of cheaper stuff second hand. Quality at a lower price. I got a professional older model hilti hammer drill at a tiny fraction of the price.
  
  It really depends anymore...it can be a tough call.
  I grew up using only quality tools, because cheap tools were truly shit until perhaps the 90's, at the earliest.
  HF tools used to be utter shit, but their "branded" tools are good these days. The wrenches and sockets are as good a Craftsman used to be, and equal to the store brands from Home Depot and Lowes. And overpriced Matco/Snap On can kiss my ass. I have some of their tools, they're nice, but not worth the price.
  Their branded cordless tools are good too. One thing they do differently is put the battery controller in the tool, while Milwaukee puts one in the battery. So don't do anything foolish with the battery.
  I don't think they're as durable as Milwaukee, the plastic seems harder, so more prone to cracking. And the warranty isn't very long.
  But with the massive cost difference, it's a good place to start.
- Seconded. This has been my strategy for accumulating personal tools.
  Proper/professional grade stuff I have:
  Circle saw
  Drill
  Screwdrivers of various sizes, especially PH2
  13mm ratchet spanner
  The rest is of a lot more dubious quality.
- That is something I would disagree with. Especially when it comes to battery powered tools which seems to be everything nowadays.
  If you go with one of the big brands you are almost guaranteed to get a spare part later. If you only use your drill once a year, the battery might be dead in a few years if you don't take care of it. Of course your battery might cost the same as a no name drill, but that is still a fair point IMO.
  Now that you have a drill maybe you need a saw later. If you went with a big brand they typically have a large range of devices that work with the same batteries. So you can reuse your battery from the drill and also don't need another charger for that single device. This is also not limited to tools only. Maybe you need a light or a battery powered radio for something totally unrelated.
- This is very situational. I'm not a contractor, but I spend a significant portion of my time doing hobbies that require power tools. I don't need a drill that will last for an entire day at a jobsite. Ryobi works fine for me. On the other hand, I wish I had never spent $600 on a cheap planer; I knew I'd want a better one eventually,, and sure enough, I found a need to upgrade after a few years. Now I've spent $3600 on planers. I could have just gone with the $3k one and saved myself $600.
  If I'm going to use it once, I borrow it. If I'm going to use it every few months, I buy a cheap one. If I'm going to use it every week, then it's worth it to me to buy something I can keep for at least a decade or two.
- Pretty good for anything that can kill you if it fails. Even beyond power tools.
  So, for example, yes to drill. No to compressors, jacks, etc.
  
  For jacks I always assume that it can break at any moment. That is why I put the spare tire under the car when I have the car lifted. If the jack breaks, the car will fall on the tire and not on my face.
  
  That’s pretty good advice, thanks.
- I forget which brand it was, but I once bought a drill........charged the battery overnight, went to use it......and it died within 3 seconds. Literally 3 seconds. Thing cost like $100 a couple of years ago. Now I got a DeWalt, and it's fine.

Unpopular opinion but wine.
From my experience majority of people can't distinguish between 5€ wine and 500€ wine. And even if they do, they say it tastes "a bit better", not worth the 495€ difference. Pick one that tastes good to you and don't be ashamed if it's cheap.
- I drink between $5 and $500 bottles, and while I will agree there is a distinct difference at the higher end, it doesn’t mean the $500 bottle will be better than a $20 bottle to the person drinking it. I humor the people that care about the price, but distinct notes of so-so music doesn’t spin my wheels.
  
  Also very cheap wine seems to give worse hangovers. I’m guessing due to lower quality ingredients, less filtration, and less aging.
- I somewhat disagree, 5€ is too low to get a decent wine imo. Buy a wine for 10-15€ and there is no longer any difference from the 500€ one.
  The last point however is the key, and I agree wholeheartedly. If you can find one for 5€ then that is good enough
- I'm not much of wine drinker myself, but I once did a chef menu with the wine pairing. Every two dishes, they'd bring out a new glass of wine. It was kind blowing how the would taste one way with the first dish and a completely different way with the second dish. I'm not sure I can tell the difference between a $12 bottle and $40 bottle, but in that one meal i understood two things: first, if you know what your doing, wine and food pairings can be magical and, second, I don't know what I'm doing.
- I highly disagree. I always walk in and say. "Vitner! Your finest box of wine, on the double"
- I’m far from a wine connoisseur and my favorite is an $8 rosé wine you can find at your local grocery store.
  
  Brand?
  I’d also check out the Willamette Valley pinot noir for a cheap light red.
- There have been so many studies showing that everyone from average joes to top-tier judges can't tell the difference between cheap and expensive wines.
- Seems something like [Proportion of People OK w/the Wine] - [Price] might be:
  50% - $5
  75% - $10
  90% - $20
  95% - $30
  99% - $50
  I made all of this up. Who actually drinks wine? Did I come close to your made-up numbers?
  Also assume some of the highest-rated wines at each price point for consumers who appreciate that style in general.
- Wine is a huge scam.
  Sommeliers are just salespeople making shit up.
  It's bullshit, you don't detect notes of 15 different things all mixed together.
  
  The French Fiasco (or whatever it was called) in the mid-70's is proof.
  
  It's actually not really that hard, any cook worth their salt can make a good shot at reverse-engineering a sauce from tasting it. It just takes a lot of practice at tasting things.
- There are so many great tasting cheap wines! My favorite is about $16-18 or so but I'm perfectly happy with $4-8 wine too. I will agree though that there are some extremely interesting and complex flavors to be found in the high end stuff that I find very compelling, and can understand the appeal of, but I ain't paying for it.
- Depending on the country, and where you shop. You should spend more if you can tell the difference, but not more than that.
  On the expensive end you are paying for the famous canteen+region, and if you go to a wine shop you could find something from a less known vineyard that is as good for less.

Video games. Unless it's a game I play with friends I typically wait for it to drop in price significantly.
- Also, if you're not going to play it this week, think twice! And, if you're not going to play it this month, think a third time!
- Yup. My strategy has long been:
  Put game in wishlist.
  Wait for it to drop to under 20$ (or close)
  Profit. Well maybe not profit, but save money.
- Also good to wait until all the bugs are worked out. Been playing Cyberpunk recently and it performs really well!
- Waits and waits but Nintendo won't budge.
  
  Nintendo's stuff is free on day 1, or a few years after release if it's their Wii U stuff. I think the first Wii took a year before the Twilight Hack happened.
  Let's hope they fuck up again on the Switch 2!

Apparentlyv Mr Clean MagicErasers are just melamine sponges which are actually mucho cheapo
- I buy the giant blocks of 100 generic melamine sponges from Amazon.
  However, having a couple of the Mr clean versions around is prudent. They are slightly different. They deform more easily and disintegrate faster but they get deeper into crevices. It's super rare that I find something that generic ones won't do a great job on but it's good to have a couple of the name brand ones for that time when they don't cut it.
- Yeah, great for cleaning, and I got a pack of 100 for like $4
  
  Mr Clean is like $4 for 2 if you're lucky

Over the counter medications. Store brand ibuprofen, allergy meds, cold medicine, etc. Sometimes as much as 1/7th the price, just make sure the active ingredients match amounts and you're set.
- https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/06/17/metro/dozens-of-cvs-generic-drug-recalls-expose-link-to-tainted-factories/
  https://www.forbes.com/sites/arthurkellermann/2024/01/10/we-should-test-generic-drugs-to-assure-safety-the-fda-hates-the-idea/
- Most of the time, yes. Though certain cough medicines have been apparently using benzene in them, which is insane. (Cheaper to produce)
  You can look for carbomers in the inactive ingredients list, but they don't have to put that info in if they don't want, which is insane to me. We need regulations that ban carcinogens like benzene being used for the manufacturing of drugs.
  https://www.npr.org/2024/08/16/nx-s1-5077764/millions-of-americans-may-be-getting-cancer-causing-chemical-in-generic-cold-medicine
- The problem with store brand medications is they often will have the same active ingredient, but then will have a cheaper or less-effective catalyst used. This generally causes them to be less effective. At least this is what I was taught years ago. I've definitely noticed a difference in cold/sinus meds. Generic does not compare to brand name Sudafed.
  
  Decongestants are a weird one. Pseudoephedrine is available but is behind the pharmacy counter where most people don't realize they can get it. Pretty much every other nasal decongestant has been replaced by phenylephrine which is extremely ineffective. Both the generic cold/sinus meds and sudafed PE will be most likely be phenylephrine, and you might as well not waste your money at that point. Actual pseudoephedrine (sudafed or a generic if they make it) will help.
  Reminder, I am not a doctor, pharmacist, or healthcare worker. I'm just a rando on the internet who has heard a lot about this.

College books.
- Yar har libgen be free

pets.
- When people ask which breed my cats are, I respond with the truth: Purebred neighborhood conglomerate. They're both healthy, happy, and awesome.
  Just make sure you don't cheap out in their medical care - sterilization and any necessary vaccinations.
  
  God's perfect killing machine is the pinnacle of cat "breeds". It's heartbreaking seeing people do to cats what we've done to dogs with selective breeding for purely cosmetic traits.
  
  Neighborhood kitty is still cute kitty!!! But they gotta be healthy kitty.
- If you are looking for a companion, definitely. If you are looking for an animal bred for a specific purpose, find a reputable breeder.

Former chef: Knives. My most expensive knife is $80 with a lifetime warrantee. Most are $10-$20. Instead, learn how to use and take care of a knife.
- Yup. I learn that the price tag doesn't make much of a difference. Sharpening tools do.
  
  I've been sharpening my knives for a year or so now, but last week i bought this piece of plastic with the angles for different knives on them and it leveled up my sharpening game significantly
- Good advice but I wouldnt really call that 'cheaping out'. You can buy kitchen knives for 2$ which you definitely shouldnt do
  
  Disagree. My favourite paring knife came from a discount bin at a dollar store in a pack of five. You can find decent knives at a dump if to you look hard enough, depending on your definition of cheap.
- I can pay a little more for a nice forged knife, folded steel, but anything you buy at walmart or amazon is the same quality regardless of price.
  Handles make a huge difference but they rarely impact price.
  
  I refuse to get a forged knife, I demand the real thing.
- In my experience the vast majority of cheap knives can't hold an edge at all. The super budget stainless used is just too soft. At the same time I can find many in the $70-100 range that do considerably better in that regard - I sharpen them 3-4 times less frequently.
  I prefer to spend a little more on the 1-2 that get the most use.
- Knife handles are important. If you buy a cheap knife where the handle snaps while you’re using it, you’re going to get cut.
- I think you should get expensive knives as a convenience, or you are pushing the limits of the steel. I cook a lot, and do lots and lots of chopping to cook food for the family. There have been times I've fine diced 10lbs of onions in one go, on top of cabbage, tomatoes, peppers etc.
  With that much chopping, anything that can't shave like a razor is dull. That's why I use a really nice knife, thinned, sharpened and tuned it to my preferences.
  TLDR most people are fine to use any generic knife (if you lack self respect) but if those aren't cutting it for you, get something better. No pun intended
  
  I work in a restaurant and 10 lbs of onions lasts 36 hours. We buy the shittiest chef knife Ed Don has to offer and it's fine. I like nice knives on a hobby level, but they're not necessary on a personal or professional level.

The first round of tools for any hobby or DIY project.
If you don't know what you want from a screwdriver, snips, circular saw etc. then there is no point in buying the super primo bells & whistles expensive stuff.
Once you've used a tool and learned what you don't like about it, or what you actually use it for, or how often you actually use it... Then you can make the informed decision to just buy another cheap one, or splash out on something that's actually fun to use.
Buy the 2nd last tool you will ever need.
There are rare occasions where "buy once cry once" apply. But it's rare
- My attitude has become to buy high-end tools because even if I don't use them again, I got the best possible experience when I did to decide whether it was worth it, and chances are I can resell it (keeping the box and all accessories) for barely enough discount to have rented some piece of shit that I couldn't choose to keep if I wanted to.
  And bad tools make bad products. A tablesaw that can't cut a straight line and starts to wobble after 10 uses doesn't make you want to keep doing that. When I've replaced a bad tool with a good one, I like the feeling I get when it just works properly.
  I've bought enough cheap-shit tools over the years to change my attitude entirely on this. I've gotten lucky sometimes, but usually you pay for what you get.
  
  Power tools are sometimes the exception to the rule of buying cheap tools. Saws are probably the biggest exception. My cheap corded ryobi saw is awful because it's so flimsy, and the deck bends. The makita saw I replaced it with is 100x easier to use, more accurate, and safer.
  Buying cheap tools applies to hand tools, air tools, hydraulic stuff, etc.
  
  I like this approach, it reduces waste significantly.
- I call it the Harbor Freight rule - If I need to buy a tool for the first time, I buy the cheapass Harbor Freight version. If I then use the cheapass version enough to kill it (or make me wish I was dead instead), then I spring for the expensive version.
- "Buy once cry once" seems to apply very well to wire cutters. (Link is to a YouTube video about how terrible most wire cutters actually are)

Cell phones and plans. Any phone is good enough for regular use these days. And any carrier uses the towers of all the other carriers, it's not like the old days where there was CDMA vs GSM.
- The most expensive and cheapest phones are not worth it. Anything in between is good enough. For me at least prepaid phone plans are better than contract plans.
  
  Can find great deals for 2yo second hand high tier phones
- There is at least ONE exception in the US: Firstnet. They primarily use AT&T's towers, but they have some additional resources that other carriers don't have - they have additional towers and entire network bands that other carriers don't have access to. This allows us to still have coverage in natural disasters or network congestion times. In addition, if there's a natural disaster that knocks out coverage, they have satellite-based trucks that stage DURING the disaster, then come online as soon as it's over.
  A few years ago, I had to ride out hurricane Ida in New Orleans (long story). The western eyewall passed directly over the house we were in, and the primary trunk lines coming into the city got destroyed by a cable tower that collapsed into the Mississippi. The next morning I had cell phone coverage when none of the other carriers had come back online yet. We didn't even have power, but my phone worked perfectly.
  You have to be a first responder to join - you have to be added by your department's communications coordinator.
- if with cell phones you mean the non-smart, dumb phones then I can agree. however if you buy the cheapest of smartphones, what you'll get is even more datamining than usual, which you may be even unable go remove because it's bootloader cannot be unlocked.
  but I would say don't cheap out on tech generally, because you'll get extremely weak security and nonexistent respect towards you as a customer.
  smartphones is a dirty business. don't support the bad actors with your many, and then long term with your data
  
  I mean beside the fairphone and pixel with calyxos and graphenos or the librem 5 (and THATs a niche user that'll like that one) the rest all seem equally malicious towords us users.
  
  Nah, cheap phones often have their bootloader unlocked/unlockable. Really happy with my POCO M5 running modified AOSP. Also, unlike every expensive phone nowadays, it has 3.5mm jack, SD card slot, and exceptional battery life for hiking/trekking (it survives 5-6 days as just a camera+map phone with all power saving on, in comparison people with flagships typically only last 2-3 days with the same usage and power-saving techniques).
- Bell and Rogers actually don't share their towers in Canada.
- Redpocket is really cheap if you guys want some prepaid plans
- I believe what you say about networks using each other’s towers is incorrect for a large portion of the world. Where do you live?

Wrapping paper and bows/ribbons. THey're just gonna get torn up anyway, no reason to spent a ton of money to make it fancy
- My grandfather used to wrap our presents in the comics pages from newspapers when I was a kid. I loved it.
  
  Same for me. It was easy for him to spot which gifts were from him when bringing them to our house and putting them together with the other gifts too, so that was another win in his book :)
- I just use brown kraft paper and some basic ribbon in a color appropriate for the occasion. I think maybe $15 in materials has given me a solid decade of gift wrapping and I haven't even gone through half of it yet. Costs basically nothing on a per gift basis, and I get way more compliments on my wrap jobs than I did before I switched to using brown paper.
- I had a friend wrapping gifts in the free maps you could grab at the post office and library. Those always looked cool.
- Gotta love the wrapping paper so thin you can see the gift under it

Power tools. If you are not a professional and need to buy a tool (if you can't borrow one), buy the cheap one.
I used a $30 Ryobi drill for over a decade and it was fine.
- Ironically, it didn't break, but when I was on the road and needed a power drill to fix something, I didn't feel bad about dropping $500 on a new Milwaukee from Ace hardware.
- I wouldn't even call Ryobi the cheap one, they are good quality and cost more than many others. Harbor Freight is what I'd call cheap - my rule of thumb is that very simple hand tools from HF are OK but anything complex is probably not
  
  We needed a router for one job. My boss got a router from Harbor Freight. Burned through the brushes halfway through (same day). Swapped brushes. Finished the job.
  His alternate plan (if we burned through the second set): return it as dysfunctional. As it would be same day, replacement would be natural.
  I think he ended up taking it back for a refund after the job was done.
- But don't cheap out on drill bits, nor should you try and use the same drill bit for like a decade without sharpening it.
  Think of drill bits like a good, sharp knife. Knives cut far better and far easier when they sharp, exactly the same with drill bits. If you trying to cut something you would normally pick the right type of knife to do the job, exactly the same with drill bits.
  If you driving screws or other fasteners with your drill consider better quality driver bits if you have a lot of them to drive, such as building a deck. Good quality driver bits cam out far far less and will take more torque so be faster/go in better. Using cheap driver bits is probably worse than using cheap drill bits.
  
  Is there a sharpener you recommend? Drill Doctor?

Clothes and housewares. Buying secondhand is vastly cheaper, better for the environment, and can get you surprisingly high quality sometimes.
Over the counter medications. If the active ingredient is the same, delivered in the same way and in the same dosage, the effects will be the same.
Games. There's no good reason to not wait for a price drop and/or sale unless it's some multiplayer thing and you want to play with friends. In the modern day, you'll even usually get an improved product after more time has passed for patches and updates.
- In case someone needs to hear this:
  DO NOT PREORDER GAMES FROM AAA-DEVELOPERS/STUDIOS
- I agree with all of those. Some of my favorite clothing I've gotten thrifting. I've been able to find never worn brand name clothing for way cheaper. Heck. I recently got a pair of Eddie Bauer shorts, never used (still had the baggie with spare buttons attached to the waistband), for $5.
- Second thrift stores, especially for any small appliance that a couple might get 2 of from their wedding. You can often find a brand new crockpot or juicer or coffee maker. 👍
  
  Also anything potentially breakable. Crockery, glassware etc. Best to have something that's already been stress tested in someone else's home.
- Fun Fact, Zertec is just Citrizine Hydrochloride but 10x the price of generics.
- On board with the thrift shops! I got a $250 brand new wok for $10 and it's the best one I've ever used.
- I love second hand shopping for everything, even smartphones and laptops. Just yesterday I bought several pairs of shoes for the kids, some nice sweaters, toys and two wine glasses second hand and I paid 18€ in total, no lie.
  Society was brainwashed into buying new shit, while drowning in second hand shit that just looks slightly different. Insanity!
- https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/05/16/723545864/the-generic-drugs-youre-taking-may-not-be-as-safe-or-effective-as-you-think

Wine - it is full of marketing gimmick and usually the mid range is best. The same is with whisky, rums and other alcohol.
On the other hand, at least here, is better to pay premium for craft beer.
- Depends on the country you're in.
  
  For wine it is universal, but yes I can't get decent cider without paying premium, I think that in UK it is different.
  
  I think there are some really good Bourbons in the USA, but idk how they compare to expensive whiskeys.
- If you like the taste, why pay more?

Possibly an unpopular opinion among parents, but: Diapers. I've noticed no negative effect on my kids when going offbrand.
- I remember the expensive ones, Pampers, being way worse, the pee is so absorbed the kid doesn't feel it but is still in it and get irritated skin, and poo leaked way more easily.
  
  Yeah, that's the only real difference I've noticed: The fit. On my oldest kid, libro fit best. The rest were offbrand. I think it's mostly down to each individual kid and not so much the brand.
  
  Ditto. They also smelled worse too. We found that the Target brand diapers when Target has their gift card deals was the time to stock up on their whipes and diapers.
  
  Shit, I never thought that might be why, but we've dealt with a lot of skin irritation, and our kid prefers keeping a dirty diaper over getting changed. My day is ruined.
- We tried cheap ones, but our kids get irritated skin from them. Pampers works for us. That being said, I'd go for the cheapest brand that works for the little ones.
- Consider spending a bit more on sustainable, non-popular brands.

Canned fruit salad, the ratio of ingredients is for some fuckdamn reason federally mandated so there's little difference between brands.
- (i) Peaches. Any firm yellow variety of the species Prunus persica L., excluding nectarine varieties, which are pitted, peeled, and diced, not less than 30 percent and not more than 50 percent.
  (ii) Pears. Any variety, of the species Pyrus communis L. or Pyrus sinensis L., which are peeled, cored, and diced, not less than 25 percent and not more than 45 percent.
  (iii) Pineapples. Any variety, of the species Ananas comosus L., which are peeled, cored, and cut into sectors or into dice, not less than 6 percent and not more than 16 percent.
  (iv) Grapes. Any seedless variety, of the species Vitis vinifera L., or Vitis labrusca L., not less than 6 percent and not more than 20 percent.
  (v) Cherries. Approximate halves or whole pitted cherries of the species Prunus cerasus L., not less than 2 percent and not more than 6 percent, of the following types:
  (a ) Cherries of any light, sweet variety;
  (b ) Cherries artificially colored red; or
  (c ) Cherries artificially colored red and flavored, natural or artificial.
  Provided, That each 127.5 grams (4 1/2 ounces avoirdupois) of the finished canned fruit cocktail and each fraction thereof greater than 56.7 grams (2 ounces avoirdupois) contain not less than 2 sectors or 3 dice of pineapple and not less than 1 approximate half of the optional cherry ingredient.
  (3) Packing media. (i) The optional packing media referred to in paragraph (a)(1) of this section, as defined in § 145.3 are:
  (a ) Water.
  (b ) Fruit juice(s) and water.
  (c ) Fruit juice(s).
  From https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfcfr/CFRSearch.cfm?fr=145.135
  
  This is amazing.
  
  And not more than one square inch of peach peel per pound of salad!

Generally, medications. It's pretty rare you have some sort of specific metabolic issue which calls for the branded version; the generic is usually just as good. I have a note in my medical records to NOT give me the branded version of my meds because there's something in the expensive ones that gives me horrific reflux, while the others don't.

Most people are being very specific, but I'd say consumables in general. Rarely is a name brand food or medicine any different than generic. Often they're literally produced in the same factory. Stuff that's meant to last, generally a more expensive product will be made more durable (not always), but this isn't a consideration with consumables. If it's a one-time use or edible, I'm going with the cheapest option 99% of the time.
- It's funny how people won't cheap out on something like a mattress or clothing but consistently buy the cheapest food possible which is going into their bodies.
  
  You spend at least or about a third of your life on a mattress. That shit's important.
  
  I agree with eating healthy, but if you're buying cheese-it's, as an example, the generic brand is equally bad for you as the name brand. You should still try to make healthy choices, but name brand doesn't make anything healthy.
- I agree except for condiments. They're cheap enough already compared to how long they last that I think it's worth springing for the good stuff. Duke's Mayo, Grey Poupon mustard, Cholula hot sauce, Ken's Steakhouse salad dressings, etc. If a bottle lasts you six months, what difference does a few dollars make?
  For staples like flour, bread, canned products, OTC meds, who cares. I'll go as cheap as possible.
  
  You’re calling Ken’s good?
  My friend once wrote a letter to them about how bad their blue cheese dressing is. In return they gave him a voucher for a lifetime supply of it. That shit is disgusting, IMO.

My default is to buy the grocery store's house brand unless I can tell the difference.
A 26 ounce can of Morton's iodized salt at my local grocery store costs $2.19. The Food Lion brand costs $0.79. Explain to me why I would pay more than twice the price for name brand salt?
Especially in goods where I know the complete chemical formula of the product like salt and sugar, until I encounter a serious problem with quality or unethical sourcing I'm not going to pay for the brand name.
- This is especially true with generic medicines.
  The cheapest I can get Claritin in my nearest supermarket is 50¢—$1.12/pill.
  The store brand can be as low as 7¢—37¢/pill.)
  The CostCo version is 2 or 3¢/pill.
  All of them are the same. 10mg of loratadine, highly regulated by the FDA.
  They can differ with inactive ingredients, so maybe you'd like a syrup or something from a name brand. But it legally has to be the same active ingredients, in the same amounts, in the same forms.
- For salt, you can just get a 50lb bag of de-icing salt for $8, and be set for life.
  Jokes, but there is a bit of a difference in crystal shape which matters. A teaspoon of fine salt can be almost twice as much by weight as coarse salt, and flaky salt is different again. But I just use kilo bags of cooking salt (medium coarseness) in cooking, and delicate flaky salt for finishing and for things that dont get cooked, like salad, icecream and raw fish.

Tbh about everything. Most of retail is just an industrial scale of the addage "a fool and his money will soon be parted".
Buy second hand, its fine. You probally can figure it out yourself, try to diy. Look at what people are actually doing not the brand of tool they are doing it with. Its a saw, you saw with it, you can get away with sawing a lot of stuff with the same cheap saw.
Soaps are just collections of chemicals, powerwash for example is just dish soap plus water and isopropal alcohol.
You can probably cook it at home. It will probably be better and better for you, because a pound of lard or cup or sugar looks like the red flag it is when you go to cook with it.
Your bed might be better on the floor, then on a frame.
You are probably better off walking or biking then driving.
You probably don't need to watch more shows anyways so why get fleeced to subscriptions. You probably don't need to play games as much so you can pass on that game. You probally don't need to go out for a drink. You probally don't need to go out for a meal. Etc etc
Honestly, I'm a hypocritical ass saying some of this, but its true. The urge to go spend spend spend, isn't a fluke its just successful sociol engineering to separate us fools from our money.
- Fancy bedframes are overrated, but having a mattress on the floor is not great. It needs to breathe from the bottom. You can get or build a very cheap and functional frame, but i would advise against having your bed on the floor for a long time.
  
  I air out my mattress when I wash my sheets (leaving it uncovered for that day) and push it vertical on the wall (like a Murphy bed).
  I know I'm saying don't buy anything, but I have always gotten those terry cloth textured water proof covers for my matteress too. Getting fluids out of mattress is just a losing battle
- I think a $60 metal frame for a mattress is usually a good idea, you can store stuff underneath
  
  Have less stuff :p need less storage, but honestly this is the best reason I've heard
- I will also add one thing. It does depend on how much money you have . In modern world what you realy pay for is convinience. So if you dont want to make soap( im going with this example beacuse it arguably the most extreme ) because its cheap and not worth your time than buy it but if you live in a 3rd world country and need to save every penny than go for it. Likewise there is no need for you to cheap out on some subscription if you have steady income and milions of $ in the bank account
  
  But why do we really need convenience, right? I agree there is a real argument for outsourcing labor to a more specialized group, but honestly a lot of the time we trying to save hours or minutes so we can spend more time and money consuming some bs to fight our boredom.

Mascara. There are some $6 mascaras that are way better than the $25 ones.
- As someone that often doesn't wear makeup but keeps some on hand anyways in event of special occasions, can you point me out some $6 brands?
  
  Not op, but i personally like this one: https://a.co/d/73OQhwB It clumps up a little bit, but a lash brush helps.
  
  I like E.L.F. volumizing mascara.
- The trial and error is important, so you might end up buying a bunch anyway
  
  I'm old, so I've done the trial and error a while back - and it is upside from here. 😉

- Plus buy only one pack ahead of time since you don't know if they will even fit. None of my newborns came out small enough for newborn size anything.
- I actually had the opposite experience with my son. When he was a newborn and wasn't eating solid food yet he didn't have any solid poos and was blowing out the Pampers at least once a day.
  Once he was size 2 we started buying store brand but it was also the same time he started eating real food so he would blow out far less often. Now he's 11 months old and hasn't had a blowout in probably a couple months and we've been using store brand diapers with great success

Not sure if this counts as cheaping out, but wait a year or so before buying computer games, when the price drops by 50% or more. Some never seem to price drop and others get really cheap right before the sequel comes out.
- Patient gamers for the win!
- https://Allkeyshop.com

New cars. After a car has been owned by one owner, for however short a period of time, it dramatically reduces its price. At least in the UK.
- Yeah, I'm in the process of buying a new (to me), and I seriously question the value of a factory-fresh car. I've concluded that a car that is 2-5 years old is a much better purchase.
  
  Cars lose like half their value as soon as they leave the lot. Buying brand new cars is always losing move.
- In a place with frequent floods, I advice you to to do your car history check.
- Same is true for the US. Sound advice.
- If you don’t care for prestige, Opel or Vauxhall is a good bet in its premium segment. The Opel Insignia drops almost 50% in the first year and is actually a pretty good car.
  
  Don’t buy one with the Stellantis 1.2 PureTech engine with a wet belt. The belt will disintegrate too quickly.

Water

Generic medicines

Dishwasher rinse aid.
- I too started using rinse aid after watching technology connections. Got a generic bottle and that shit works great!

Air filters. For car, HVAC, etc. Branded or OEM stuff is usually overpriced.
- One exception: I wouldn't buy a noname filter claiming to e.g. be a hepa filter or having high MERV rating - I wouldn't trust a brand that might not be around long enough to be penalized for false advertising
  
  Yeah, agreed. If I needed a filter for allergens I wouldn't trust noname brand too

- I envy y'all with more versatile skin. Mine would turn to rash on the wrong brand.
  
  You might be sensitive to lanolin, it's in many skin products
- Sorry, but you have a lousy doctor.

Reading glasses.
- Aliexpress has really cheap ones. Buy 2 as sometimes they're not up to scratch (1/10 I'd say).

Hot dog buns. In my opinion, the generic, white, store brand buns make the best hot dogs.
- I like top split buns. They don't fall apart

Things like gift bags, disposible table cloths, tableware.... Get all that at the dollar store.
- Check other stores first. Dollar stores these days are basically just big convenience stores without many actual deals.
  
  Pretty sure they are talking about the ones where stuff costs $1.

- Yeah, for utilities I try to estimate numbers and or timespan of usage and shop accordingly. If it’s for my type of heavy usage, I try to go for quality. And good quality does not automatically mean luxury price tag.

Liquor in general. Don't buy the cheapest shit on the shelf, go for the 25-50 range and you'll be set. Unless it's something you're passionate about and enjoy exploring there's no need to spring for the expensive booze. Liqueres and assorted (non liquor) cocktail ingredients on the otherhand... go for the genuine article. 99% of the time you'll still be in that 25-50 range so I hardly see a point in being cheap with them
- Greatly depends on the type of alcohol. Since aging usually makes things more expensive and generally it greatly reduces the bitterness and alcohol "sting" as well as increasing the flavor from barrel woods and other additives, things that are aged often take a big jump in quality along with the big jump in price.
  But outside of aging, you're definitely on the money. The stuff that's 25-50 is usually the best bang for your buck. The more expensive stuff is usually inflated by marketing like good advertising to make it popular or gimmicks like fancy bottles.
  
  I respectfully disagree, with the caveat that alcohol prices are highly location dependent. $25-50 will get you a great bottle of bourbon, rye, rum, cognac, etc. You're right that aging drives up the price but you'll be in good company for the majority of aged spirits. Exceptions being scotch and Irish whiskey but just barely. And even then you can find really good bottles in that price range for both if you know what you're looking for. 100% agree that the fancy stuff is usually inflated due to marketing and other associated pap
- I'm a big fan of islay whisky, and while there's a lot of good stuff in the top shelf, the middle shelf should also have a lot of nice ones.
- Lol, I've said for years that you should always buy second cheapest booze (unless it's a variety you're passionate about). Never go cheapest because... Shudder... But usually second cheapest is good enough.

People are gonna pillory me for this, but flashlights.
First off, you want something that runs off two AAAs, regardless of price. If you can't walk into any gas station, or any grocery store, or what have you, and buy batteries for your flashlight when it dies, it's not gonna matter how bright it was before it died. You also don't want anything brighter than ~200 lumens at the very most, unless you actually need one brighter, for some reason; they drain batteries way faster. You want something thin enough that you're able to clip it inside your pocket and forget it's there. You also want one that has an end switch that toggles between two modes: "full power" and "turned off." If you have one that toggles between low and high settings, you will only use the high setting. If you have one that toggles between low and high settings, and strobe and SoS, you will only use the high setting. Every additional step in between "all the way off" and "all the way on" is just friction you don't need, that will do nothing but piss you off every time you use the damned thing.
The features that make big, fancy flashlights expensive, are anti-features.
- Down vote for AAA, the one battery size nobody ever seems to have laying around.
- I read this entire thread thinking we were talking about fleshlights and not flashlights.
  
  AAA's seem really common in my neck of the woods.
  I got a Coast headlamp a couple years back that has a rechargeable battery pack, but can also take regular AAA's, which is a handy feature if I happen to need an immediate recharge.
  
  For outdoor survival stuff (like my avalanche beacon) they say you should only use the disposable ones. It's probably got to do with cold tolerance or lifetime.
  For Avalanche beacons you're supposed to replace the battery after it gets below 95% charge.
  
  Do you have to replace things with broken, End of Life or dying cells often?
  I notices a lot of things falling into planned obsolesence because "it's rechargable" and you can't replace the battery.
- I've paid quite a lot for my second headlamp for hiking, but I am really happy with the purchase as it's very light (35 g) compared to my first cheapo one (~120 g), while being the same 200 lm max. It doesn't sound like much, but it's enough for me to not even notice it, while the heavy one was getting annoying after a while.

T-shirts. Get a 5 pack each of white, black, and another color you like. There, you're set for like a year for $30.
- Pfft look at mr moneybags here with his 5 shirts. Just wear one shirt for 6 months, turn it inside out and wear it for another 6 months, then wash.
  
  I can smell you through the comment, if that somehow is a thing
- Just a year???? How do you burn through shirts that fast?
  I have some from like 8 years ago and they still hold up to today.
  
  I have 2 types of shirts-- shirts for when I go out, and shirts for when I'm at home or mostly at home. I like the former to stay completely clean, and I like the latter to be comprised of 1+ year old t-shirts that can get dirty/stained without worry.
- I tried amazon basics for the frist time and I must say, the quality for price ratio is amazing (sorry). Not sure abt sustainability though …
  
  Fruit of the Loom makes nice t-shirts too. Wore them as a kid and now as an adult.

For most people, tools. Most tools will be able to complete the essential tasks. Most people will get by with cheap or used tools.
I have a motto "cheap gets the job done, expensive does it faster". If you are a hobbyist working on your own time there, feel no pressure to get a "real" tool. Additionally if you are a hobbyist short on personal time, you might want something better.
- To go along with your motto, cheap breaks replace with expensive if you still need the tool.
  
  Buy the 2nd last tool you will ever need.
  When you are replacing it, then you upgrade to the last tool you'll ever need

Headphones. Once you get to the $300 range, the more expensive ones sound different, not necessarily better. I have some electrostatics that have great extension, but the “real” sound is so harsh after a few hours.
- I'm not sure you should "cheap out" on headphones per se. The really cheap ones are usually horrible, both in terms of sound quality, usability and comfort (well, except for wired Apple ones, allegedly, though they never fit me right). It's just that it makes no sense to go for really expensive ones, unless you're really into audio and love hearing the tiny sound reproduction differences between them, or enjoying the different tech etc. The middle ground of $50-$100 for in-ears and $100-300 for over-ears will often offer you good/great/excellent sound quality and the same usability&comfort as more expensive ones.
- Yeah, I've noticed this too. I'm not an audiophile, but I do enjoy quality audio. Everything seems to plateu around the 300$ price point. At that level, the sound is reproduced with as much accuracy as reasonably possible, and the build quality is pretty good. Anything beyond that point is basically added "features" and does not reflect improvement in sound reproduction.
  I don't want "Tripple bass rumbler", or "Crisp treble supercharger". I want my headset to reproduce the audio as perfectly as possible, without altering it.
  Come to think of it, adjusted for inflation, the Roland headsets I've had for the past 20 years have all been around 300$
  
  How can you reasonably enjoy Subwoofer: The Movie without the $1600 triple bass rumbler?!
  
  I mostly agree with that, I would even go as far as saying that the reproduction quality starts to plateu with good $100 devices. A vast majority of the audio recordings isn't just good enough in quality for a good headset too make much of a difference. All of the music if you're using spotify xD.
  That said, I don't have a lot of things, but I consider the outrageusly expensive Sennheise IE 600, I typically wear 10h+ daily, worth it.
- Yeah, I'm in pretty much the same agreement. As long as it's tuned well, comfort takes top priority for me. Sometimes though, the right combination of things can cost a bit more.
- I can't say I necessarily agree on this one as I really enjoy my nicer headphones, but $300 is probably the price where you hit some serious diminishing returns. It could also be argued that many (most?) of the more expensive headphones have no business being priced like they are.

Toilet paper, trash bags, paper towels. If you go the absolute cheapest, they're arguably defective, but the second cheapest is usually ok.
- As a man with a rats nest of an ass, I will mever buy cheap toilet paper again.
- For all three I always get nice generics. Way cheaper than big brands in ADs and very acceptable quality.
  
  I've been saying other brand instead of generic. I feel like generic causes a stigma around not purchasing a specific brand.

Saline nasal spray. Just get the generic. It's just freaking salt water.
- Just make it yourself, 1g of salt in 100 mL of lukewarm water
  
  For anyone reading this…
  MAKE SURE YOU BOIL THE WATER FIRST
  
  Does this recipe need high precision? Because maybe that is a no-no for people without a decent scale and some volumetric equipment. Sure, if you already have this stuff it's fine, and probably you know good practices like using a properly treated volume of water. But if you don't, it's perhaps better to just buy the cheaper stuff.

Toothbrush. Anything you'll use comfortably will do the job.
- I have to disagree. A good electric toothbrush makes a big difference, personally.
  
  Sonicare might be expensive but it leaves my teeth feeling cleaner. It's like having that perfectly smooth clean feeling after a dentist visit every day. No way I'll ever go back to manual scrubbing like some sort of troglodyte.
  
  It can, yes, but even a cheap toothbrush used properly will do the job. No need to buy brand name when the store brand will do.
  
  Electric toothbrushes with the rotating head collect germs behind the brush head. Enjoy your tasty germ colonies..
- Same goes for toothpaste, apparently. I asked my dentist once, and according to her the type or brand doesn't matter that much as long as it has fluoride in it.
  
  as long as it has fluoride in it.
  that's the standard dentist answer for that question, except when you ask the 10th one
  
  We've been brainwashed by advertising to think that the paste and mouthwash are what matter. They help, yes, but brushing is what matters most. The toothbrush is not just an applicator.
  That said, I personally find Sensodyne to work better than other brand's product for sensitive teeth.

Alkaline and rechargeable NiMH batteries. The price per hours of use favors the cheap brands. A top brand might last longer but you are paying a premium for it. Rechargeable NiMH batteries with a good price to battery life ratio are from IKEA.
- Same. I'm using IKEA brand in the keyboard I'm using to type this.

Cloths, headphones, handbags. Anything that's just buying the brand.
I don't get why I should want these high end brands when the only thing I can afford from them is plastered with their logo.
I've seen the Gucci tracksuit, the Jordans, the Beats, everything and I'm not impressed. Even though luxury things are luxury I don't even agree with the luxuriousness of many of these products. For example, if I'm going to wear a Gucci tracksuit covered in the Gucci logo and using Gucci colors then it's gotta look good first and foremost. If I'm going to hold a Hermes bag that's not comfortable, or durable, or robust but is just supposed to look cool, then it's gotta actually look cool! Not like something Shien could design.
And yes I am aware of the concept of buying a store of value: diamonds, expensive watches, actually rare and valued handbags. But most of the famous luxuries I see in public are not that. They're literally a poor man's status symbol IMO.
- For headphones, DEFINITELY not true in my experience. There’s cheap and gimmicky (like Skullcandy), there’s perceived “luxury” brands like Beats (which aren’t actually worth their money) but then there’s brands that actually offer significantly better quality and longevity for the price, like Sennheiser, Beyerdynamic, Audio-Technica and Sony to name a few.
  
  Sennheiser, Beyerdynamic, Audio-Technica and Sony aren't famous luxury brands in the same way that Beats are.
  huh... in hindsight I didn't think about my position about headphones all the way through, I was just mad about the existance of beats.
  sry
  
  I bought some $50 open back headphones a while back and they a just worlds better than anything I'd had before. Is there a step up from there that'd similarly rock my world?
  My mic is pretty similar. $100 got me an SM58 and it's wonderful. You have to basically eat it and I can peak it if I'm loud. But it sounds so much nicer than most things. I know there's a few steps up from there. But I don't sing so think I'm fine.
  
  And still, Koss rocks hard with their same for twenty years headphones
  
  You forgot Bose their ANC is insanely good. Sennheiser aren't impressive to match their high price at least not the model I tried speakers are good but fitment and feel they put all the money into drivers and sound rather than comfort wait for gen 2 or 3. I tried the newest Sony 1000xm5 earbuds and headphones and they didn't hold a candle to jabra, crapple, Bose. Only kind I tried and didn't like was the JBL (mid brand), and Samsung buds.
- Why are you talking about Beats like they're real headphones?
  
  They are categorized as headphones

You should just stop spending money in general if you can. So many responses are like "buy literal garbage like disposable decorations at the dollar store," do not do that. Stop spending money on garbage. Every dollar you spend is damage to the environment and more power for the wealthy, just stop it. Stop spending.
Don't buy entertainment, use archive dot org. Read more. When you like something culture you consumed, give it to somebody else so they don't try to buy it. Pass entertainment around to your friends.
When you have to spend on things like haircuts, repairs, etc, keep the money in your social network. If you don't cook, learn. If you aren't a part of your local grocery distro, join it.
Avoid giving corpos money whenever you can and you'll save lots of money.
- When you have to spend on things like haircuts, repairs, etc, keep the money in your social network.
  While I agree with the idea of not buying garbage, there is absolutely no way we can unconsume ourselves out of the capitalist ploy to extract surplus value. Do not put the blame on people who try to (often) satisfy legitimate needs, but on those forcing labor to be spent at the cost of both the environment and workers themselves.
  Ecofascism (not accusing you here) is not going to solve the climate crisis.
  
  I'm not suggesting unconsuming, I am suggesting consuming outside of the corpo economy and limiting the use of fiat economy. And this is an ideal to work toward. I think about money I don't spend to a corpo as money that hasn't been extracted from my community.

Dollar store seasonal garland. By the time it's up in your home, it looks about 2/3 as real and costs 1/10 the price.

A lot of basic foods, for instance: tuna, Pop Tarts(toaster pastries), Frozen Veg, Dry Pasta.
The store brands are so much cheaper and often higher quality.
- Disagree on tuna and especially for Pasta.
  For pasta if you want to have a bite to it (al-dente) and not become soft you need to get a good quality one. Doesn't need to be a lot expensive, but typically Italian ones are safer in this front. Better ones are bronze extruded as it leaves the surface that is porous. If that is not important to you, then ignore:)
  
  Anything that comes in light creme color and over 14% protein usually is pretty decent.
- Don't know about the rest but canned tuna has an enormous taste difference. Try a good 10 USD can!
  
  The stores I go to do not even sell $10 cans of tuna. Rich people really do live completely different lives huh.
  
  There's also ethical concerns regarding sustainable fishing practices.
- Malt-O-Meal cereal is often better than the name brand and even comes in a resealable bag.

Oculus Quest headstraps.
The official "pro" headstrap (~$70) is cheap quality for an expensive price point and isn't as comfortable as the stuff you can find on Amazon for, like, thirty dollars.
- Buy that from the sellers own website for even cheaper.
  
  Yeah, fair.
  Really just gave an Amazon link because I can just ask my search engine for !a quest 2 headstrap and quickly find the one I got at the top of the list.

- As an asexual I agree.

I usually by the house brand of anything the first time I buy anything. Cooking ingredients, household chemicals, drugs, tools, and anything else you can think of. I have found a number of places where saving money is not worth it, the difference between organic tomatoes and the conventional ones is huge for example but if you don't care about tomatoes you may be fine with the cheap ones.
There are a few things I will spend good money on first time through. Basically anything I am not going to have a chance to replace if I don't like it. I had to replace the floors in a few rooms in my house. When we first moved in and could not afford nice carpet. It took 10 years to wear out the carpet and for us to have enough to replace it. If I had to do it again I would have stuck with the original longer to save a bit more and put in better flooring.

Jean creamer. Even the cheap stuff works wonders.
- Instructions unclear, I creamed my jeans.
- Can you give me an ELI5 on what that is? Google only shows me picture of various women.
- I use the free stuff, like, all the time

Sandwich baggies. They're dispose anyway, no need to go for the name brand when there's usually a cromulent generic at the store.
- Uhhh actually you wanna stick with ziplock brand on those:
  https://www.globalfoodconsumers.org/news/toxic-pfas-in-sandwich-baggies/
  Notably, previous instances have occurred where regulators permitted high levels of PFAS in packaging, only to later discover adverse health effects on consumers. Brands such as Boulder, Complete Home, Great Value, If You Care, Lunchskins, Meijer, Target, and Walgreens were among those found to contain PFAS, while Ziploc emerged as the only brand without detectable levels of the chemicals.
  
  TIL

Ingredients. Who the fuck cares if your bread has a pretty pattern on the packaging or not, you're gonna turn it into shit. Minmax your groceries.