In December, ANZ Bank approached me with a brand new initiative they’re running next month. In order to encourage women to save, they’re launching an Australian campaign- Febusave.
Febusave invites women to pledge one thing they want to give up (shoes, shopping, treats) for the month of February and setup a savings goal. There will be coaches, tips and tricks to help you out as an added incentive, ANZ is giving three Australian Febusavers $5000 each. At the end of the month, each Febusaver will report back on how they went with their goal.
• Skipping your morning latte can save you around $70 per month
• Bringing your lunch from home just 3 days a week can add up to $1,560 in your pocket
The month is part of the bank’s Being Money Confident program, which is designed to empower women and enable women to be smarter with money. As we know weddings, money, saving, marriage can be a controversial issue and with the recent discussion of money on the blog, I wanted to be a part of the initiative not because it’s run by a bank, but because I really believe in everyone (and not just women) becoming more in touch with their finances and more confident with money.
The research ANZ did prior to the campaign showed:
• 58% of women have less than $5,000 in savings and 33% have less than $1,000
• 56% of Australians do not save money on a regular basis
• 52% of women claimed they know they should have a financial plan but keep putting it off
• Only one in ten women are very confident in managing their investments, financial planning and superannuation
• Less than one third of women surveyed said they were very confident about managing everyday finances.
My thought is this- by pledging the savings during February and taking a deep breath and talking about it on Polka Dot Bride, you may be able to afford the vendor that is really important to you, or a honeymoon, or a house deposit, or even more importantly go into your marriage without debt.
By talking about Febusave on the blog, perhaps we can promote a little more thinking about why some of us (because I know Polka Dot Bride readers are smart) struggle with being confident when it comes to creating our own financial plans and dealing with financial security.
I pledged to give up snacks and treats for the month of February and have set my own savings goal.
In addition to saving through the month of February, we’re going to make the first week all about money. I have a few features and exciting people coming to visit us, so hopefully we can inspire each other to save! To register for Febusave check out the website here.
I’m thinking about giving up shopping for a month, not sure if that is going to be achievable or not!!
Saving money to then spend it on a wedding will not make women better off and would make no difference to the figures you have quoted. Surely the aim of such a project is to encourage women to spend less on items that generate no interest and future security – and instead to invest it!
While I agree that investing money and saving for the future is a fabulous and very worthwhile (if not essential) idea, being a wedding blog, for many of our readers chances are the next big expenditure for a lot of readers will be a wedding- even if one month of saving (or cutting back on splurges) helps a couple not go into debt for their wedding- surely that is a good thing?
My belief to get behind this month is not purely about saving money on wedding expenses but also to start to think about where the money is going, what your financial plan is, whether you have talked to your partner about money (because I know there are couples not communicating about money before the marriage) and how you can delve into your own financial security.
But above all of that- getting into the habit of saving. If someone chooses to save for their wedding and then continues that saving afterwards, there’s going to be much more security than no savings at all (which the report showed is a big issue).
I have to disagree with Claire – I am saving money then spending it on my wedding so that I won’t be paying off my big day for the next year!
I’m pretty sure that after the wedding it’ll be very easy to find my next savings goal – a holiday, a house, children…
Jetsetting Joyce
We were given money for my wedding and we had a chic event for 40 close friends and family. It was fab and we only spent 25% of what was kindly given to us by my parents. Rest went towards setting up our future. I acknowledge a personal interest in Febusave as I am contracted to ANZ. However I really think this initiative will show how by giving up something small or thinking outside the box for a major event, shows you can still really enjoy life without being saddled with a big bill you spend ages paying off, as Jetsetting Joyce said.