Zine Review: Hello My Name is Frugal

 

Hello My Name is Frugal

Zine, Anneliese Schoppe, 8 pgs, $5

In the age of side hustles and creative subsistence lifestyles, we are all counting our pennies. Anneliese Schoppe has packed tons of penny-saving tips and good, financially savvy advice into Hello My Name is Frugal.

Anneliese’s first tip is one made by example: save printing and paper costs by packing your text super dense! There’s a lot of information in these 8 pages, but the basic guidance is to identify financial goals, create a personal budget, and then follow Anneliese’s collection of tips to meet those goals within your budget. Anneliese covers financial awareness basics like banking, shopping and self-control. A budget worksheet is included so you can break down your monthly expenses. All kinds of suggestions are offered to make socializing cheaper. Anneliese also offers critical questions to ask yourself before you buy something to make sure you’re checking your impulses.

This is a great collection of information and will probably help some people out. The dense formatting can make the zine a little tricky to navigate or just hard to digest. Based on some pieces of advice (like using particular resources at the Winnipeg Public Library), I gather that the zine is directed to a Winnipeg audience. Some of that advice is probably transferable to other communities, though. In general, this looks like a helpful resource, and worth checking out. (Joshua Barton)