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I'd be hard pressed to think of an article I've skimmed that I relate less to than this one. In my first dorm room, the priority was a mini fridge, for obvious

I'd be hard pressed to think of an article I've skimmed that I relate less to than this one. In my first dorm room, the priority was a mini fridge, for obvious reasons. It may have been the only dorm-specific item I bought. The box it came in became our coffee table for the entire year.

Jtsummers 5y ago
Minifridge + footlocker for me. The footlocker became the pantry and coffee table for us, and a way to get my things home at the end of the year.
Wowfunhappy 5y ago
The author says she had a similar experience as a student—it was when shopping for her son more recently that she encountered all this! > A $150 bar cart that can be a “side table or a study area.” (The top of my ugly rental fridge was my bar cart.)
leetcrew 5y ago
yeah I'm kinda confused also, and I only graduated a few years ago. other than the (very important) minifridge, I doubt I spent more than $50 on "dorm outfitting". nor did I see "dorm outfitting" as some conspicuous class signal. the rich kids had nicer clothes and maybe newer laptops, but otherwise their dorms looked just as shitty as the rest. the "cool" dorms were decorated imaginatively, not expensively.
- ryanianian 5y ago
  For some reason fancy rugs and bedding were very popular with the wealthier kids at my school. About 15 years ago. Faux fur and shag were all the rage. It seemed so fancy at the time, but in reality you can buy these items at Target for around $100, even back then. The desire to spend some money to show off a fancier "self-made" home existed, but it wasn't lead by a marketing system or influencers. I have no idea how they all came upon shag before social media was a thing, though.
brightball 5y ago
Half the fun with friends in college is because everybody is broke.
- bluGill 5y ago
  With student loans that isn't as true as it used to be. Today your required expenses are all covered, so every penny you earn from the part time job can be spent. They might only earn minimum wage, but all the required expenses are not paid for by the job (parents provide health insurance and a car; tuition, room, and board all come from loans), thus everything earned can be spent on whatever. This will all come to haunt those students who take advantage of it in 4-8 years when they are out of school and need to pay off those loans.
marcinzm 5y ago
Yup. The extra furniture we got was either from craigslist (ie: international student leaving country, has 24 hours to get rid of everything) or used items from the school itself (ie: classy dumpster diving). I went to a very elite school but almost no one wanted to show off how much money mommy and daddy had.

Jtsummers 5y ago

Minifridge + footlocker for me. The footlocker became the pantry and coffee table for us, and a way to get my things home at the end of the year.

Wowfunhappy 5y ago

The author says she had a similar experience as a student—it was when shopping for her son more recently that she encountered all this! > A $150 bar cart that can be a “side table or a study area.” (The top of my ugly rental fridge was my bar cart.)

leetcrew 5y ago

yeah I'm kinda confused also, and I only graduated a few years ago. other than the (very important) minifridge, I doubt I spent more than $50 on "dorm outfitting". nor did I see "dorm outfitting" as some conspicuous class signal. the rich kids had nicer clothes and maybe newer laptops, but otherwise their dorms looked just as shitty as the rest. the "cool" dorms were decorated imaginatively, not expensively.

ryanianian 5y ago
For some reason fancy rugs and bedding were very popular with the wealthier kids at my school. About 15 years ago. Faux fur and shag were all the rage. It seemed so fancy at the time, but in reality you can buy these items at Target for around $100, even back then. The desire to spend some money to show off a fancier "self-made" home existed, but it wasn't lead by a marketing system or influencers. I have no idea how they all came upon shag before social media was a thing, though.

brightball 5y ago

Half the fun with friends in college is because everybody is broke.

bluGill 5y ago
With student loans that isn't as true as it used to be. Today your required expenses are all covered, so every penny you earn from the part time job can be spent. They might only earn minimum wage, but all the required expenses are not paid for by the job (parents provide health insurance and a car; tuition, room, and board all come from loans), thus everything earned can be spent on whatever. This will all come to haunt those students who take advantage of it in 4-8 years when they are out of school and need to pay off those loans.

marcinzm 5y ago

Yup. The extra furniture we got was either from craigslist (ie: international student leaving country, has 24 hours to get rid of everything) or used items from the school itself (ie: classy dumpster diving). I went to a very elite school but almost no one wanted to show off how much money mommy and daddy had.