how is the credit crunch affecting you

[sunrise]

I'm spending my afternoon balancing the books after the christmas spend up and was just wondering how the credit crunch is affecting everyone
we managed to stay on top of things this christmas but are generally watching the pennies,
while its so cold the heating is on but when its not so cold we are trying not to use it quite so much.
I'm writing a weeks menu before I go shopping and trying to stick to just buying what we need,
I'm trying to drill into everyone to turn lights off and have replaced normal bulbs with energy saving ones.
I'm a worrier anyway but my son and I are both in retail and so is my hubbys second job so I constantly worry about if we lose our jobs.
If I were to lose my job but have a very very small card business ( last year we didn't have to pay any tax on it as it so tiny and this year although we might have to pay tax it won't be that much ) if I'm classed as self employed does that mean I wouldn't be able to claim anything ??
All this would be bad enough but its coupled with the fact that last year my hubby decided to throw a big wobble and change his job taking quite a big cut in his wages.
I hate having all this constantly in the back of my mind , I feel as though I'm not enjoying my job ( or life ) much at the moment as I'm scared of losing everything

[matt.chatterley]

It's not affecting us (either personally, me + OH or 'us' as in 'The Business') too much at the moment - although like yourself, at home, we're being very careful to mind the pennies (time to quit smoking too - now officially too expensive).

Businesswise, we are seeing an increase in enquiries, both from people who are choosing this as the time to take the plunge and kick off (or ramp up) their own businesses, and from existing small businesses who want to try and get a solid start to the year.

That said, we've not had many bookings as yet - I think people are more interested in finding out how much things are going to cost, so that they can try to budget, and people are holding onto the spending money, at the moment.

On the other hand, Jan is normally quite a bad month to get people to part with their cash even in good times..!

[xrheax]

We really pulled our socks up last year and got all our debt sorted. It means that we don't have much spare cash at all though, although we do manage.
My biggest gripe is energy. I really cannot afford this at all, especially gas (we have our gas on for one hour each day, and that's more for the children, our youngest son is only 2 and finds it much harder to stay warm than we do!). We changed to energy lightbulbs a wee while ago and they have made a difference. I also cook a lot from scratch, which is actually more expensive, but we do like our food, and as we don't eat out or buy takeaways at all I think this isn't bad. I have tried to combat this by watching cookery programmes that show how to cook on a budget, we also only buy meat if it is reduced and then we stick it in the freezer.
We have to budget more carefully, If I have a bit of spare money left every month, which at the moment I am using to buy the childrens school uniform after the summer. I have also bought some christmas presents while they were on sale, and I bought new shoes for my kids the other day as they were down to £2 a pair.
I don't really buy my kids lots of new things throughout the year anyway, I try to play with them and every christmas for the last 5 years they have been bought a board game each, which is now turning into an impressive pile. We don't go abroad for holidays either, we go camping!

As for sales, I honestly thought work would slow down between November and February. I haven't been working at this long and I figured with the credit crunch I wouldn't get much in the way of orders. Thankfully, I have had far more than I expected and although not enough to really make any sort of profit, I am in my first year and hopefully it will improve.

[sunrise]

I have this theory and I hope to god that I'm right
firstly I work in hobbycraft and I'm thinking that when people start watching the money then they will try and make things for themselves.
homemade cards and gifts for example, making their own wedding cake etc etc
instead of immediately buying new clothes they will mend the ones they already have.
If they're getting married ( and I notice that is the business you're in ) I hope that for the safety of my job they start to make their own invites etc
for the safety of your business and also everyone on here who makes handmade items I think we can offer unique items at a lot cheaper price than they would get in the shops so I'm hoping they will turn to us

[Delta]

I'm having a dose of deja voo here, I am sure I have just answered this very thread on another forum

[sunrise]

you quite probably have lol

[Delta]

Ahhh, well at least I know I'm not going mad now