Here’s another item I saved from the forgotten shelves for my own daily use: shoes! Actually, I have two pairs of shoes I bought at thrift stores, both of which looked like they could have just as easily been sitting in the box at Macy’s. Both brands, actually, are carried by Macy’s and other department stores.

One pair I bought are brown leather Steve Madden casual glocks. When I bought them about a year and a half ago, they were on the shelf among many other used shoes, all priced the same at $3. I picked them up only because they stood out as looking exceptionally, “new.” Indeed, the shoes looked to not have ever have even been worn out of the store. In perfect condition, they have worn nicely and I still wear them (as in, today!).

More recently, I came across a pair of Kenneth Cole clogs. I paid $5 for these, but they literally still had the stickers from the store on them and looked as if no one had ever had them on their feet. The insides are brand new, and clearly they’ve never hit the pavement (until yesterday’s trial run, by yours truly).

How did I acquire these? A simple matter of having my eyes open and being in the right place at the right time is the simple answer. I don’t have some magic formula. Most of the time, I happen to be walking past a thrift store, step in and check out what they have. You can give most thrift stores a glance at everything in ten to fifteen minutes and it’s fun!

All in all, I would say I spent twenty to thirty minutes checking out these two pairs of shoes (that’s two separate visits to two different thrift stores). I check out the stores, typically, when I’m in the neighborhood and this is much less time than I would spend on buying shoes from a mainstream department store. Why?

Well, when I’m plunking down $60-$90 on a pair of shoes, they had better be, “just right.” If it’s $5 or less, as was the case with these, no biggie. They look new, they feel new, they fit, and look at that price! Yeah, I probably saved a good hour or two when compared to the time I may have spent picking out new shoes from a store.

And how much money saved? Let’s say the average shoe with these labels (which I do like) is $75 a pair, considering some being higher but also the fact that I tend to wait for the sale, but not always. So I feel that’s a fair average. So, $150 minus $8? Whaaaa? I saved about $140 buying shoes at unconventional sources.

How much environment was really saved? That’s what this site and this series is all about, right? We’re talking about the small actions in our lives that add up to making or breaking our environment. So, consider the leather, poly-fibers, and rubber that goes into shoes, the box that carries them to me (oh, and all of that tissue paper), the process of making them, the fact that they are likely shipped to the store by boat and then truck. If that already happened for this pair of shoes, and it gets a second chance at being worn, then that’s one (or in this case, two) pair of shoes not being made, transported, and worn by an end user.

Sure, you may be saying, “so what?” You could say the same about that one aluminum can you threw in the trash instead of the recycling bin. But the fact is that it all adds up to either a sustainable life, an unsustainable one, or at the very least, an improved envirohuman impact due to some conscientious micro-decision-making. This is one of those small changes that, in the end doesn’t save the world, but does improve my own personal envirohuman impact.

I don’t say that to pat myself on the back but rather to challenge you, my readers, to seek out items that you also can find used, often in as good as condition as if it were found new at the store! And look at that extra cash in my bank! Yes, improving your envirohuman impact can also save your pocketbook.

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