Page 149 - Purchasing Power Black Kids and American Consumer Culture

134 . Anthropologist on Shopping Sprees

Like several other children, Ricky was very clearly focused on getting
as much for his money as he possibly could. He loved a Lamborghini
model car but realized he would have to buy cement and paint for it. He
went so far as to pick all of these things out and carry them around cradled
in his arms as we continued up and down the aisles, but he suddenly de-
cided it was too expensive and put everything back. Farther down the
aisle, he saw a big styrofoam glider plane. At $3.99 it was about half the
price of the model car and certainly gave the impression of getting more
for the money, being about three feet long. He decided he wanted to buy
art supplies with the remainder of his money. He took a great deal of
time evaluating different packages of pens and pencils, their properties,
their prices, how many were in a box. He chose things that could be used
in more than one way: markers that changed color if treated a certain
way, and colored pencils that could be used to do watercolors, too. The
marbles were to be added to his marble collection.
Unlike the purchases of many girls, nothing that Ricky bought direct-
ly linked him back to his family. This was quite common among boys
(except Davy). His purchases remain, like those of most children, practi-
cal and well thought out. He wanted to buy the tube repair kit first be-
cause he was afraid he would forget if he put it off until later in the trip.
One of the most impressive things was Ricky's ability to spread the
twenty dollars out so that it satisfied many areas of his interests and ac-
tivities: the tube repair kit for mobility and peer interaction, the plane
for playing, the art supplies for drawing and making things, the marbles
to add to an already existing collection.

Teyvon
Teyvon came shopping with me on a Sunday afternoon the day before he
was to begin a summer school enrichment program. He spent his entire
twenty dollars on an outfit to wear for the first day along with a sum-
mer's supply of notebooks, paper, pens, and pencils (table 5.6). Our first
stop was Sam's Dollar Store on the downtown mall's first floor. Teyvon, a
skinny kid who always seemed to be pushing his large round-rimmed
glasses back up to the bridge of his nose, wasted little time and we spent
all of five minutes inside Sam's. Spotting a salesperson right away, he
went right up to the man saying, "Excuse me, where are the notebooks?"
The man pointed them out and Teyvon chose one. "Excuse me," he
shouted out in his raspy, piping voice, "where is the notebook paper?"
For a total of $5.37, he bought a notebook, one package of pencils, two
packages of pens, and two 200-sheet packages of filler paper.