Garbage – An Afterthought of the Recession

The recession has got us all thinking a little differently. Money’s tighter, so how we spend it is changing. Many of us are looking for our dollar to go further. One way to do this is to consider the lifespan of the products we buy.

Here at NEMO we’ve been talking about planned obsolescence and the idea of creating a product that is made for the long haul. According to Wikipedia, planned obsolescence “is the process of a product becoming obsolete and/or non-functional after a certain period or amount of use in a way that is planned or designed by the manufacturer.” (Vacuum cleaners come to mind as a great example of a product that doesn’t last as long as it used to.)


Americans might be the biggest offenders of closets full of "junk" and that’s not an idea we want to perpetuate. It’s always been essential to NEMO’s mission to use high quality materials and construction to create a product our customers will be able to use for camping season after camping season. Recently, we have been trying to take this to new levels in our product line.

Along these lines, a friend forwarded this article on foreclosed homes (NY Times) and the garbage that comes with them. Seeing as my husband and I just built a new home, this article hit ‘close to home’ as we talk about furnishing and moving in. Every time we make a purchase, we make a statement about what's important to us and what we’re willing to spend money on. I think consumers play a much bigger role than they realize in determining future products and their design.

BEACH CLEANUP UPDATE: On Friday, we picked up 178 lbs. of garbage from Jenness Beach.

Photo courtesy www.nytimes.com.

~Kate