DECOLONIZING OUR ASPIRATIONS

INTRODUCING THE REVISIONARY HOLIDAY SHOPPING GUIDE

originally released 1 December 2020

Last week, we shared a gift guide preview - hope you enjoyed it! Now you can access the complete Revisionary Holiday Shopping Guide on our website - featuring a curated selection of over 150 products from more than 100 BIPOC-owned brands. You can explore these items by category, price range, and impact (sustainable brands or Black & Indigenous owned brands). Let me know what you think, and please feel free to share any thoughts or suggestions! Also, highly recommend sharing this guide with your friends and family since you might end up receiving some of the lovely items that are featured...

Also last week, we had discussed the concept of #ReclaimBlackFriday, so I wanted to share this article on Racism, Capitalism, and Black Friday that offers a more detailed overview of some of the ideas that were mentioned. The end takeaway remains the same - a call for us to refocus our holiday spending towards Black and Indigenous owned brands and away from the big Black Friday / Cyber Monday sales promoted by large retailers.

In a broader sense, there has also been a movement to reconsider the temptations of these drastic sale prices. This is a great explanation to start with - Why Are Sales And Markdowns Exploitative? - which discusses how the excessive markdown cycle is intertwined with unethical labor practices that disproportionally affect Black & Brown communities globally, while also playing a major role in promoting overconsumption that is harmful to the environment. This isn't talking about the small discount you might get for signing up to an email list, but it's problematizing the drastically slashed prices and extreme sale mentality associated with events like Black Friday / Cyber Monday.

The prevalence of fast fashion and massive markdowns has warped our perspective of pricing. We can try to reset our relationship with pricing by making a point while shopping to consciously consider the labor and cost that went into an item's production, logistics, and marketing - and whether an item could have been produced ethically at the price you're paying. Inevitably, this is would mean buying less and spending more money on fewer items - ideally from smaller businesses and BIPOC-owned brands.

Here are a few of my favorite items in the Holiday Shopping Guide, from brands that we haven't featured before:

When you purchase the serum, you also receive an invite to The CommonRoom - a kind of digital group therapy experience.

The Floral Tasting Collection set offers 3x of each of their 3 flower teas and would make a fantastic gift.

The bag shape is based off of the classic Japanese furoshiki style and uses a scrunchie scrap that gives the purse a light bounce while you walk.

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