I love ultra cheap products

I didn't know about the 72 watt bulb you mentioned, but if someone wanted an old style bulb, I could see it reasonable to pay $5, 10 or 20. Sometimes the others don't fit or don't work well for outside fixtures. TBD.

Quote: 1nickelmiracle

I didn't know about the 72 watt bulb you mentioned, but if someone wanted an old style bulb, I could see it reasonable to pay $5, 10 or 20. Sometimes the others don't fit or don't work well for outside fixtures. TBD.

The 72 Watt bulb uses a process called "Halogen Energy Saver" incandescent to get it's efficiency . It uses a special chamber to reflect formerly wasted heat back to the filament to provide additional lighting power.

It is not nearly as efficient a compact fluorescent bulb, but it does meet the requirements of the new law. At only about twice the price of the traditional bulb, it still should save you money over the long term in usage. You also don't have the "fit" problem you have with CFL bulbs and fixtures designed around traditional bulbs. You also don't have the slow startup or the rather unpleasant light color.

As these bulbs are roughly $1.50, I think they sort of give you a top end over what people would pay for a traditional bulb. So if you buy crates of traditional bulbs for 65 cents apiece, you may be able to get $1 for them after a year or two, but you probably won't get $1.50 since people can buy these HES bulbs at a regular store.

I don't see any valid reason why your old bulbs will ever go to $5, $10, or $15.

The other problem is that the shortage will only happen with plenty of warning. Most people who are worred about this price increase will have plenty of timtime thee to store several boxes for future use. There won't be a shortage for years, and by that the HES bulbs may come down in price.
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We switched the garage, basement, and closet lights to CFL, and nightlights to LCD for $4 apiece. Although that seems like a lot for a nightlight, they are so efficient that they are not worth the bother of turning off.
I still can't pay $30 for a lightbulb.

Quote: Pacomartin

If I remember correctly Edison Tungsten filaments 100 Watt Bulb was about $0.65 apiece. The 26 Watt CFL is about $4.33 and the 72 Watt Ecoadvantage is about $1.40 . The last one complies with the law.

I realize that people purchase far more 60 Watt bulbs than 100 Watt bulbs, but I am not aware of any speculative market developing in the old style 100 Watt bullbs (despite the cheapest alternative being twice the price. I am sure that some people bought a box to keep for replacements.

I expect to see more hoarding boxes of 60 Watt bulbs (compared to 100 Watt), but I can't imagine people buying them on speculation. They are simply not worth that much.

As I understand it, such speculation is perfectly legal. The law only restricts manufacturing. But you would have to rent a warehouse and hold onto it for at least a year. Your costs would destroy any profits from increased value in the bulbs.

I don't see speculation being worth the trouble. Hard to make speciation work for such a product. One thing it did work for was R-12. Even then it took years and profit was called when conversion kits came out. I bought a can for $4 and sold it about 10 years later for $20. IOW the return of a good stock. The ROI on light bbs just will not be there.

Can you buy the old ones in Mexico?

Cheap products... hmmm... that old-fashioned device called radio has gotten rather cheap over the years. There's one sold on eBay that is 11 Short Wave bands, AM/FM and sells for $10. If you buy a better radio with it, the shipping is free on the cheapo. I have one, and is remarkable in that it gets plenty of AM stations, quite a handful of shortwave stations, and with careful tuning a good number of FM. I can use it to listen to R. Australia from the E. Coast USA early in the morning, Voice of Russia (English) in the Afternoon, and China Radio International at other times in English. And of course R. Cuba is almost un missable. R. Espana also. Of course the pol. slant/rant is somewhat humerous if not interesting. And to top it off, the battery life of this el cheapo is about 400 hours on 2AA cells. If the Zombie Apocalypse comes, I'll know how we're doing elsewhere in the world, complete with National Heroes lol. One of the better $10 bills I've spent. The other radio winds up being the best $50 spent so far, with full DSP reception on all AM/SW/FMst. bands. Really picks up signals in the noise well, and makes niche broadcasters heard like Radio da Amazonia, R. Mongolia, NBC Zambia with their cultural music listenable. But its a bit battery hungry due to processing power... 3AA's go 100 hours.

Any thing on cheap TV or CaTV???

Google glasses may end up being the ultimate cost saving device, as they have the potential to replace books, movies, television, and many forms of human interaction like bars, concerts, travel, etc.

Maybe Google Glasses will create the zombie apocalypse.


Possibly Google Glasses will create real life digital Potemkin Villages, as you can set them on rosy.

One little item I like is Jelly Belly Belly Flops I have found at the Dollar Tree. They are labeled as irregular in shape or flavor. The overall bag is bigger with less variety of flavors, but some of the beans are two stuck together. Although there is not as much variety, some may like this because there will be more occurrences of what you do have and often with bigger beans.
It is always fun with Jelly Belly to pick blindly to guess the flavor, with a friend to witness what you ate. This option might be difficult with Belly Flops, because there is not a guide on the bag.

There is also a product which you can make yourself or buy cheaply called a bucket washer for clothes. This video show how to wash your clothes with only a bucket, plunger and lid. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6eYzhZg2Cs
The wringing by hand and rinsing will be the most difficult part of the process if you are not in shape.