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Buy Nothing Day 1999:
No-Shopping is much more fun than shopping!

November 28 1999

Sint-Michielsgestel, The Netherlands, 28 november - No-Shopping is fun! BND-activists from all over the coutry are madly enthousiastic after the fifth Buy Nothing Day in The Netherlands.

,,Is was terrific, amazing'', said Judith Lorand from The Hague. ,,We talked to a lot of people''. Lorand was no-shopping in her living room at home, but for one day this living room was rebuild on a carrier-tricycle. Sitting in a luxery chair, drinking a cup of tea, she watched the shoppers in the streets. Many people thought she was the queen and waved.

No-shoppers in Delft caused a lot of merriment with their Unhurry Couche (Slow Down Couche) they were carrying through the streets. 'Buy now, live later', was one of their slogans.

No-shoppers in Nijmegen demonstrated a 'Konsumeer' (Consu-lake), a childrens bath filled with consumer goods, like a electric back scratcher.

,,We received exclusiveliy positive respons'', says Frieda Reijners in Roermond, a city in the south of the Netherlands. Buy Nothing Day was celebrated here for the first time. Four rats were doing a rat-race, meanwhile talking to eachother by mobile telephones. They were pushing overloaded shopping cars and one of them was in the mean time busy with his mobile computer.

,,We laughed a lot'', says Jaap Bouman in Spijkenisse. In this city (like in many other cities) there was a stall were people could exchange their ever-received-but-never-used presents. This was very succesful. And the critical notes (nuts) given away in Rotterdam made people smile.

Also from Hilversum much enthousiasm. No-Shoppers set up an inquiry among the shoppers (Do you like shopping? Do you buy only things you need? Has advertising influence on you? Are ethical and environmental aspects of consumption inportant to you? Do you know it's Buy Nothing Day today?) The results will be published later.

Omslag received similar reactions from Amersfoort, Arnhem, Amsterdam, Bilthoven, Den Bosch, Eindhoven, Geldrop, Gouda, Heerlen, Houten, Leiden, Roosendaal, Tilburg and Weert.

Free food, street-theatre, gift exemption vouchers, music, no shopping songs, bottles and boxes filled with Happiness or Nothing, alternative gift lists, banners, time-certificates, poems, it was all available on Buy Nothing Day.
And a lot of media coverage.

Extended reports in Dutch can be found on https://koopniets.nl There is also an English translation of all reports from Dutch cities.

Omslag - Werkplaats voor Duurzame Ontwikkeling - [email protected]
Postbus 163, 5270 AD Sint-Michielsgestel - 073-5941622 / 030-2730100

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