Know When Starbucks Pressure Kicks In With Kids

If you frequent Starbucks regularly like I do, you’ll notice the habit starts pretty darn early. I often see gaggles of kids hanging out there before and after school.

Which got me to thinking: I wonder what age the Starbucks habit kicks in these days.

So I sifted through FamZoo.com transactions over the last year to find the answer. Here’s what I found. It kicks in significantly at age 12 and takes it up another big notch at age 14 (see chart).

That makes sense. The first bump roughly coincides with the passage into middle school and the second with high school. Those are two classic transitions where kids naturally enjoy more independence and an increased desire to emulate adult habits.

So, is this early Starbucks affinity bad? Well, I can certainly think of much worse places for kids to hang out. In the grand scheme of things, Starbucks is a clean, safe, and harmless social venue.

But it is pricey. The average transaction amount we see for a 14 year old is $6.26. That’s right up there with what we found for average fast food purchases by kids.

Three takeaways for parents:

1. Realize that kids will come under increasing peer pressure to make outings to Starbucks (and other popular establishments) as they transition to middle school and onto high school.
2. Set some budget boundaries ahead of time to keep spending under control.
3. Arm your kids with some preemptive money conversation scripts to avoid awkward interactions with friends while politely declining to overspend.

Just a few things to ponder over your next pumpkin spice latte.

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See 75 Random Things Kids Are Saving For.

Seeing what kids are saving for can be revealing, amusing, classic, impressive, and even inspiring.

Here are 75 random savings goals kids have created recently on FamZoo.com:

1. iPhone7.
2. An awesome Razor scooter.
3. LEGO City Police Station.
4. Harry Potter Hermione “...I’m Highly Logical...” Magnet.
5. LEGO Super Heroes Jokerland Building Kit.
6. Lil Woodzeez Family Treehouse 22-Piece Playset.
7. A donation on plumfund.com.
8. An adoptive family travel heritage trip to Guatemala.
9. Playstation 4.
10. Disney souvenir money.
11. A manicure.
12. FIFA 17 Standard Edition.
13. Snap circuits.
14. Christmas shopping fund.
15. Rick Riordan’s Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard book series.
16. LEGO Ghostbusters Firehouse Headquarters Building Kit
17. iPod Touch
18. Super Deluxe Bow and Arrow Costume Accessory Set
19. The Pokémon Sun game for the Nintendo 3DS.
20. Summer camp (with a savings match from Mom).
21. National Wildlife Federation’s Ultimate Wild Animal Baby Adoption Kit
22. A pocket knife.
23. Soccer team road trip.
24. LEGO Ninjago Blaster Bike
25. Bird necklace.
26. “This X-Box will allow [sister’s name] and I to bond even further than minecraft. We will be able to play The Sims together, possibly LEGO Dimensions, and LEGO Star Wars games!! We will pay for all the games and we promise we will always finish our homework before even LOOKING at the X-Box. We will always be responsible and change the input of the TV back to Cable when we're done. The only thing we ask of you is that maybe you could pay half of the cost? I mean it's only $140 for you and $140 for me. sooooo yeah!!”
27. An investment in the stock market.
28. iPad mini
29. Birthdays, Father’s Day, Mother’s Day, Christmas, and more celebrations.
30. Minecraft.
31. A $50 emergency fund.
32. Hover board.
33. Seed funds to start a company at 18.
34. Magic: The Gathering.
35. A puppy, including transportation and vet visits.
36. A Chromebook.
37. A 3D Doodling Pen.
38. A graphics card upgrade.
39. Beanie Boos Safari the Giraffe
40. “I want to get a phone sooo bad, mostly because everyone else has one. But also because mine is running out of storage and the camera is half broken.”
41. Junior drum set.
42. Disneyland tickets.
43. A fit bit.
44. A survival backpack.
45. A dirt bike.
46. Horse riding boots.
47. “I love mom very, very much and I want to buy her pretty things!”
48. To go on dates.
49. College.
50. MacBook.
51. Electric violin.
52. Road bike.
53. Kinect.
54. Earbuds.
55. A car by Summer 2023.
56. A church mission trip.
57. A used Xbox.
58. A $500 emergency fund by age 18.
59. A phone insurance fund (in case it’s broken or lost).
60. Hamster cage, bedding, and food.
61. Concert fund.
62. Basketball, baseball and football shoes
63. Paintball.
64. 3D printer.
65. American Girl doll.
66. A new hair style.
67. Airsoft gun.
68. Parrot Mini Drone Jumping Sumo
69. Washington D.C. trip.
70. Donation to Alzheimer’s disease research.
71. Apple iWatch.
72. Aero sweater.
73. A Kindle.
74. Baseball batting practice.
75. Dragon shield sleeves.

What’s your kid saving for?

See anything on that list that makes you want to sit down and have a saving discussion with your child today?

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Go Agile When Teaching Kids About Money, Not Waterfall

In the early days of software, products were designed using the the “waterfall method”. Requirements were gathered first, then came design, then came implementation, then came verification, and then came maintenance. The lion’s share of the work was done up front — set in stone before the recipient even had a chance to respond. Once one phase was done, there was no turning back. Everything flowed in one direction. Downward. Like a waterfall.

So, what if the downstream recipients — the end users of the software — discovered that the upstream assumptions were incorrect? Oops. Too bad!

The result? Lots of bad software that didn’t meet the needs of its users.

These days, software is built using “agile techniques” instead. Now the water flows rapidly in both directions. Work is done in short iterations. Assumptions are tested with end users at every turn. Course corrections happen repeatedly.

The result? Good software that meets the needs of its users.

In his bestselling book, The Secrets of Happy Families, Bruce Feiler argues that parents should apply that same agile approach to building strong families. And money habits are a key part of the picture. See chapter 5, “The Buck Starts Here”, featuring yours truly.

The old-school waterfall approach to parenting, characterized by one-way phrases like “do as I say because I said so” or “do it because that’s how it was when I grew up”, doesn’t work.

Why? Kids have different personalities, evolve over time, and live in a different circumstances than we did. Constant change demands constant refinement.

So, take a page out of the agile book instead: constantly test new approaches with the kids, gather feedback, and refine accordingly.

Listen to this excellent Digital Dads podcast episode with Bruce Feiler to learn more.

As Bruce says: the secret to happy, high functioning families comes down to one simple principle: an ongoing “commitment to thinking about it and working on it — the commitment to trying.”

The bottom line: if you want to raise kids who are thoughtful, responsible, and high functioning with money, go agile not waterfall. Test, gather feedback, refine. Repeat.

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Let Your Kids See You Leave Stores Empty Handed

Stores are very clever at turning the act of entering one into a sense of obligation.

Time spent helping you, a special discount, a free sample. All play off the powerful pull of reciprocity. The store has given you something, so naturally you owe them a sale in return.

No you don’t.

It’s OK to politely say you didn’t find what you were looking for, or you need some time to think things over. It’s OK to leave empty handed.

The next time you’re in a store with the kids, challenge them to identify all the subtle reciprocity techniques at play. The free samples in a grocery store are a classic example.

Show your kids how you’re perfectly comfortable leaving stores empty handed. When you do, explain why the product, the service, the price, or the timing wasn’t quite right. Make sure they realize who’s boss: the buyer, not the seller.

The more your kids understand retail reciprocity tricks, the more comfortable they’ll feel leaving stores with nothing in their hands and dollars in their pockets.

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Resist Retail Therapy With The Kids

“Retail therapy is shopping with the primary purpose of improving the buyer’s mood or disposition.”
~Wikipedia

Scenario 1: Your kid is feeling a little blue. So you head out to the local ice cream parlor, saddle up to a double scoop, and share a little relaxed one on one time.

You just spent some money to improve your kid’s mood.

Problem? Nope.

The spending was just a modest backdrop. The focus was on quality time. No budgets were harmed along the way. No buyer’s remorse later.

Scenario 2: Your kid is feeling a little blue. So you head out to the mall, fill up your shopping bags with things you don’t need, and revel in the act of consumption.

You just spent a bunch of money to cheer up your kid’s disposition. (Perhaps you even did it to improve your kid’s feelings toward you.)

Problem? Yep.

The spending was the therapy. The focus was the act of consumption itself. You may have even torched the family budget along the way. Hello buyer’s remorse.

OK, those are obvious examples. But sometimes the line between retail normalcy and retail therapy can be a lot harder to discern. That’s why it’s always good to have the discussion with your kids:

“What’s the purpose behind this purchase?”

The more conscious your kids are about retail therapy, the less likely they are to seek it as adults.

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Add An Emergency Fund To Your Kid's Money Bucket List

Spending? Check.

Saving? Check.

Giving? Check.

Emergency? For kids? Nah.

Most people don’t learn about emergency funds until they’re off on their own. And usually it’s after they’ve already dug themselves into a big financial hole. That’s why an emergency fund is the very first step in Dave Ramsey’s famous 7 baby steps to help people dig out of financial distress.

But what if we taught people about emergency funds much, much earlier? Why not take that first financial baby step as a kid?

Kids and teens certainly have plenty of little emergencies to cut their teeth on. Like:

• That third lost sweatshirt.
• The new shoes left on the soccer field, never to be seen again.
• The hockey puck through the garage door window. Six times.
• The gaping holes in the fence from constant lacrosse ball shelling. See evidence in picture above.
• The glass pane in the side door cracked by a hurled cell phone. The culmination of a hormonal teen tantrum, the dramatic origins of which have been long forgotten...
• The massive data plan overage charge.
• The gold license plate replacement for the snooty Jaguar owner on the receiving end of a fender bump in the Starbucks parking lot.

Some or all of these may or may not have been actual emergency moments from my five kids’ earlier years. I’m not naming names...

Unless my family is completely abnormal, you’ll also have plenty of opportunities to deploy some emergency funds long before your child’s passage to adulthood.

So here’s a simple 4 step plan for making your kids emergency fund savvy:

1. Set up a separate emergency fund for your kid. Add an extra jar, account, or prepaid card to your standard set of buckets.
2. Divert a slice of allowance, chore, or odd job income to fill the fund. Temporarily amend your kid’s spend-save-give allocations to factor in the new emergency bucket. Revert to the original allocation once the emergency fund hits the target — maybe $25 for a youngster, $100 for a pre-teen, and $500 for a teen.
3. Share some skin on the next emergency. Some emergencies may extend well beyond your kid’s means. Sharing the costs on a case-by-case basis is fine. As long as there’s some shared skin in the game, the lesson will be learned.
4. Replenish the fund. Return to step 2. Rinse and repeat as childhood’s little emergencies arise.

Don’t wait to make your kids take those first emergency fund baby steps. Baby steps now might mean no crawling out of debt later.

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Take Your Family Swear Jar Online

The swear jar is a time honored family tradition for breaking bad habits.

Let loose with a four letter word around the house, and into the jar a payment goes.

But now, like everything else payment related, the penalty pot is going online.

Hip families are setting up a separate prepaid card or subaccount to replace the brick and mortar cuss container.

Make a transgression, and, boom, the penalty payment is just one tap away. No more chasing down the offender to cough up cash or coins for the jar. Instead, it’s:

• An instant electronic transfer from the offender’s account to the swear jar account,
• Captured in a permanent transaction history for handy perusal the next time the offender whines about being low on funds, and even
• Real-time text alerts broadcast to the family — just to rub it in a little. Nothing like a little group schadenfreude!

And swear jars aren’t just for cussing. Any bad habit will do. Here are just a few infractions (gathered anonymously) that have racked up demerits within FamZoo.com families this month:

• Hurting a sibling (Biting is a favorite!)
• Blowing off chores
• Cell phone data overages
• Being home late
• Messy room
• Screeching
• Backtalk (A teen classic that includes muttering under your breath. And, yes, your mom can hear you!)
• Slamming doors (another teen classic)
• Attitude (the teen catch-all)
• Lying (future politicians anyone?)

What should families do with their overflowing swear jar accounts? Donate the proceeds to charity, or spend them on something that benefits the whole family.

So do family swear jars really curb bad behavior?

Who gives a shiitake! At minimum, they’re just good clean family fun.

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