Inflation Hits My Breathe Right Strips on eBay


Several months ago I told of how I found such a great deal online for the Breathe Right strips I like to wear every night to sleep. However, recently as I have tried to find new ones, I noticed the eBay prices have increased substantially on the strips. Whereas I had previously been able to find large lots at first 24 cents, and then 17 cents a piece, now I am lucky to find anything under 30 cents per strip. I have noticed that a new, generic "Better Breath" strip has appeared for about 18 cents each, so I ordered some of those. They worked pretty good, but they do not stick quite as well to your nose as the original Breathe Right brand. I also tried the Breathe Right brand "Kid" strips which sell for about 8 cents each, but they are too small for our adult noses (but they do work for my son.) So the best deal I could currently find were two boxes of 30 for $16.99 which ends up being a little over 28 cents per strip. That is still much better than the over 35 cents each you pay after tax at Wal-Mart, but nothing like the low prices that were available months before on eBay.

 That also reminds me of the taxes I noticed this weekend when both my children purchased shoes at two different stores about 1 mile apart. I was filing the two receipts when I noticed my son's shoes were taxed 9.425% at the Famous Footwear in Brentwood Pointe, but my daughter's shoes were only taxed 8.425% in the Champs Sports in the Saint Louis Galleria. Sure, on a $60 pair of shoes that is only a 60 cent difference, but if you compare them against each other, the retail sales tax in Brentwood is 11.9% higher than in neighboring Richmond Heights. That is a pretty huge relative difference. Of course, the Galleria actually lies in the Clayton School District, even though it is in Richmond Heights and homes just west of it attend Ladue, and homes just south of it attend Brentwood schools. I have included an image with the school district boundaries below (which also includes images of homes for sale!). The blue area is the Clayton district, Ladue is just west of it (the boundary falls right on the edge of the Galleria parking lot), Brentwood is just south of Highway 40 (except for a few tiny snippets north of the  highway like the several homes in our subdivision), and Maplewood Richmond Heights is east of Hanley. Choosing where you shop in the area can make a difference to the different school districts. Shopping less than a mile and a half from our home we paid sales tax that helped two different school districts in the area, but neither are the one my son attends!




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