You won't find Jen Maier and her kids trolling the malls for school supplies this year.
The Toronto mom says she has no plans to buy any back-to-school items, preferring to leave the hoopla of one of retail's biggest seasons for other frantic parents to deal with.
Instead Joshua, 10, and Meghan, 6, will start Grade 5 and Grade 1 with their backpacks from last year stocked with many of their old pencils, pens and markers.
Last year, and every year before that, Ms. Maier loaded the kids up with sturdy new binders and flashy knapsacks. But the economy, the environment and a desire to banish clutter from her home made her change her tune.
"I've always done it in the past, like, 'Okay, now it's time for back-to-school shopping.' But this year I thought, 'You know? We just don't have the space for all this additional stuff,' " says the founder of urbanmoms.ca, an online community for Canadian women. "It just seems like a waste."
Watching both their wallets and their wastefulness, many parents are thinking twice about buying everything new for back to school. While a pristine backpack and a new trendy wardrobe are hallmarks of back-to-school culture, more kids will be returning to class with some familiar gear, parents say.
A recent survey of 400 people on urbanmoms.ca found that 78.5 per cent of parents plan to have their kids reuse school supplies from years past, while only 5.7 per cent plan to buy everything fresh.
Julie Cole's brood of six have already salvaged some of their old school supplies - a stark change from Septembers past.
"I used to just do the big dump," says the Burlington, Ont., mom. "But this year, I sat down with each of them and we went through their pencil cases and we went through their shabby pencil crayons and we re-sharpened the ones that still had some life in them."
They also rescued unused sheets of paper from battered Duo-Tangs and binders, a move that will save both cash and trees.
While recycling old stuff in a household of eight comes naturally, Ms. Cole has specific reasons for giving the school supplies a second life.
"It's the state of the economy - I don't want to be buying more things than I need to," she says. "There's [also] a lesson in it for the children about reusing. I think in the past I haven't done it because it does take time, but now some of them are at an age where I involve them in it."
But kids aren't always co-operative. What if your daughter deems that High School Musical binder so last year and would be mortified to be seen toting it again?
When Kimberly Danger of Mankato, Minn., took inventory of her Grade 3 daughter's school bag at summer's start, she was pleased to find a half-used bottle of glue that could be finished in the fall. But Sydney, 9, was having none of it.
"She thought it would be embarrassing to bring a half bottle of glue to school in the fall," says the founder of MommySavers.com, a site for thrifty parents. "I think as a parent you kind of have to pick your battles. Glue is really cheap. We ended up using it at home."
When parents hit the malls in late August, they spend as much time managing their kids' expectations as they do scouring the racks for deals, says Sara Dimerman, a child and family therapist in Toronto.
"There's the whole balancing act between being sensitive to your child's needs to want to be 'cool back to school' versus balancing your own budget, versus teaching your children responsibility," she says.
"There is something exciting and important about starting out a school year with a traditional visit to a store to purchase some products - that idea of a clean, fresh start."
When Elissa Kline-Beber bought one of her sons a backpack last year, she told him to take special care of it since he wouldn't get another this fall.
She had the foresight to go through her sons' book bags in late June, tearing out pages from lightly used notebooks and salvaging markers and pens that hadn't dried out.
"I was kind of walking the line between starting the year fresh, because I think that's also important, and also not get rid of stuff that's perfectly useable," she says. "And that's definitely something I have done increasingly over the past little while. A few years ago, I would have bought it all new."
Her boys Samuel, 10, Jonah, 8 and Ezra, 4, all go to the private Toronto Heschel School, which puts strong emphasis on environmental education.
"I think it's made all of us be more aware of what we're getting rid of and to be more conscious."
Still, many parents are starting from scratch, hunting for deals on everything from lunch bags to pencil toppers.
"None of it's in good-enough condition to use again," says Mary Santos of last year's supplies, as she holds up a large, pale purple Hannah Montana backpack at the Wal-mart in Toronto's Dufferin Mall.
After all, her daughter Selena will be starting Grade 6 at a new middle school after Labour Day, and she'll need snazzy stuff.
But over at Toys "R" Us, shopper Sara Jahan says her eight-year-old son will be using all of his old supplies and clothes from last year.
When asked whether he's okay with this, little Javid shrugs.
"It's not even my business," he says.
"Yes," his mother says with a laugh. "You have no choice, you have to use it."
