The Idea
I came up with ‘No Buy July’ (NBJ) in 2018, based on several ideas. I had read in an Earth Garden Magazine where a lady (Rachel Altenbacher) had written an article about how she ate only from her (much larger than ours) garden for a month. At the same time, I was reading David Holmgren’s ‘Retrosuburbia’ and his description of a ‘home-based lifestyle’. I had also come across the ideas of ‘zero waste’ and ‘Plastic Free July’ so I rolled everything together and christened it ‘No Buy July’.
We did it for a couple of years, then Covid turned up and it seemed that it had become our lifestyle rather than a challenge for one month a year. Anyway, this year (2024) – I decided to give it a go again to check how our systems would cope. I also, as mentioned in a previous article, wanted to ‘take it to the next level’ next time I did it, whatever that would mean. It turns out that is meant setting up a Facebook group and doing NBJ with a whole stack of other people! But more on that later!
Preparations
As usual I did some research on what we were buying and increased the variety of stuff we buy in bulk a bit like raisins & sultanas, cashews and almonds, metho (for fire starting and cleaning/disinfection not drinking!) rice, whole wheat and organic baker’s flour. I had also noticed the amount of bread we were going through. We have a breadmaker but I had some issues with it, the LCD readout was a bit funny with some parts of the display missing, and the last couple of times I had used it (with two different batches of yeast) it gave us rather collapsed dense loaves. After a bit more research, I found that I needed to heat up the water going into the breadmaker even though it had its own heating cycle initially, and the first time I used it the LCD cleared of its own accord and was working properly again.
The Facebook Group
I started working on the Facebook group (imaginatively titled ‘No-Buy July’) at the end of February (2024), the idea being that it gave me a month to put some NBJ articles together to use as featured articles pinned at the start of the group (links to those articles are at the end of this one). I wanted to go public towards the end of March so that it would give people three months before NBJ to do some research and pre-work to get the most out of it. To do the initial work I made the group private so that I could then go public when I was ready to open the group up. That is not they way things work evidently and once a group is private, it stays private according to Facebook. One lives and learns!
I wrote an article on the ‘what, why and how’ of NBJ, broke the article up into three parts (What, Why and How) then posted them as three separate posts pinned to the start of the group. I later added a pinned article on what the impact of NBJ had been on us. The group went public on the 21st of march and from that point on I posted articles from our website on most days until the end of NBJ. The articles talked about things like grocery and food buying audits, food storage, growing food in small spaces, sprouting and microgreens, foraging wild herbs, recipes of various sorts and how to do stuff like making vinegar, spice mixes and flatbreads. Other members posted as well, talking about what they were doing for NBJ.
In the end, the group got a total of 89 members.
How it went - Generally
In general terms it was fun for us, as it always is, but what surprised me was that it was less of a challenge than previous years had been. As a result of the original NBJs we did, we had set up systems such that we were used to operating on what we were growing and bulk stores that we always keep on hand. I guess this is also why the Covid shutdowns weren’t as traumatic as they could have been for us. I tried some stuff, like making our own mayo, which worked well and tried making cinnamon scrolls which did not work well. Throughout the experience we made our own yeast bread using the breadmaker and flatbreads as per my normal habit. We are still continuing to do that today.
Home made Mayo
...and, homemade flatbread!
For me, one of the greatest indicators that we had a working system was that we didn’t need to go belting out to the shops on the first of August to re-stock. Our focus on home produce and bulk stores meant there were really no things we were lacking except maybe chocolate, and we got around that by baking ANZAC biscuits as a sweet treat. I will go back to doing the shopping every two weeks, on the Tuesday morning as we did prior to NBJ.
Growing
During NBJ our garden kept us supplied with lots of veggies: bok choi, broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, cabbage, chokoes, Jerusalem artichokes, lettuce, silver beet and snow peas plus the odd capsicum and even more surprisingly, tomatoes!
A self-seeded cherry tomato came up in the northern side of the front yard under the mulberry tree and near the 5500litre water tank and next to one of the gabions so I guess the microclimate was right. It has been remarkably productive, providing us a small bowl of tomatoes every couple of days and even now it just gets bigger and more productive every day. Usually for NBJ I open jars of our preserved diced tomatoes when I want tomatoes on a sandwich, but this year I only needed to open one jar and that was it.
The garden also provided us with ginger and herbs, mandarines (although we had to fight ratty for them!) oranges and a few lemons and limes. The chooks have also been remarkably productive, giving us 3 to 4 eggs every day over the whole of NBJ.
Cash and Petrol
I allowed $50 for stuff which we had not allowed for, and a full tank of petrol for the entire month. In terms of cash, I went through $10 per week for two coffees from our favourite barista (some things I just can’t go without) and on getting home late after dropping my daughter and her family at the airport I splurged on a bit of Red Rooster for us, at the cost of $26. So overall we came in well under my allowed limit. For the petrol, we basically didn’t go anywhere except one drop off and pick up from the airport, so that we still had three quarters of a tank at the end of the month.
Final Thoughts
It has been a fun time this year, especially being able to share it through the Facebook group. Speaking of the Facebook group, here are some of the members thoughts at the end of NBJ –
Debra: “I would do it again. A good exercise in eating seasonally out of the garden, I enjoyed not going to the shops as much. And so much better for your health.”
Lauren: “Please seriously consider next year, I enjoyed the posts and they helped me assess my own path through NBJ.”
Meggy Moo: “Thank you for initiating this inspiring challenge . Due to unforeseen circumstance , I did not participate in NBJ . However, I m about to embark on an August austere venture . Your posts have given me some ideas !"
Elizabeth: “Well. Having conquered July, I am going into NB August!!! Just a thought. I had to go out today to pick up Dog Food for my little dog. But avoided all temptations to splurge on anything else just because I could!! It has certainly made me aware of spending just because you can. I have a “Colesworths” Order coming tomorrow. First for over a month. They must miss me because I got lots of emails tempting me back through July. I resisted. This time I got Free Delivery and over $50 worth of points to add to my collection! No impulse shop when you order online. And consider. And cross off the order if deemed non essential. I enjoyed NBJuly. My pantry got a big shakeout. And it was fun.”
Zoe: “Well I didn’t commit, and I didn’t achieve but seeing everyone’s comments and what they are doing did make me think about my own buying habits. It did spur me on to use more of my own produce.”
Danielle: “I shopped yesterday. It was weird. I have not missed the supermarket. I broke a day early because I had a Coles voucher that needed to be used by the end of July. My buying habits have already changed.”
Cecelia: “Thanks Nevin....always inspirational...ideas for going forward for me as I was overseas .....spending....”
Comments made prior to and during NBJ included –
Janine: “I think I need to do an audit first and then start practicing now! so I can fine tune it,”
Danielle: “I’m firming up my NBJ plans. We’ve had lots of periods of no shopping over the last few years due to floods and I don’t feel like doing a complete no buy thing as a result. Instead, I’ll have a supermarket ban and buy basic ingredients only. So, I can go to the fruit and veg shop and the butcher if needed, and I can buy milk but I’ll have to make yoghurt. I eat yoghurt every day. I’ve made it before when I used to milk a local cow, but I’ve got lazy. NBJ will be a kick-start for me”
Tong: “What a meaningful way to celebrate my birthday! I am now determined to save a few pumpkins and winter melons (no wonder called winter melon), dry up some herbs, plan to source some beans, see what I can freeze”
Wendy: “A good reminder to reduce our waste, re-use what we have and recycle what we can. Will be delving into the dark depths at the back of the pantry, organising things by their Use By and Best Before dates to use up the forgotten things.”
Angela: “We are making dog food at the moment that is mostly no-buy July. It’s got meat and offal that was already pre-purchased last month, then a few different types of lentils and oats from our stores, veggies from the garden, a few eggs from dad’s garden (our chickens are not firing yet), plus some cans of tuna from stores. He’s a lucky pup!”
Well, that’s it for 2024, why not join us in 2025?
NBJ Article Links
