Frugal zealot lets no penny pass unpinched - 'Twightwad Gazette' editor Amy Dacyczyn - Interview

National Catholic Reporter, May 28, 1993 by William Bole

Author, mother of six, says being thrifty is a matter of justice

LEEDS, Maine -- From her pulpit in rural Maine, Amy Dacyczyn preaches the gospel of frugality to a congregation that stretches across the country.

Thou shalt not toss out the Ziplock bag. Wash it and use it again.

Thou shalt hang your wet laundry and save the 44 cents an hour it costs to run the dryer.

Thou shalt lose the disposable diapers. Wash and dry your own.

Her pulpit is a monthly newsletter, The Tightwad Gazette, which dispenses advice to 60,000 penny-pinchers nation-wide. She practices what she preaches in her $125,000 farmhouse (bought on an annual family income of less than $30,000), with her husband, Jim, and their six children.

"Most people get a thrill out of buying things. Frugal people get a rush from the very act of saving," said Dacyczyn (sounds like decision), comfortably dressed in blue jeans and a gray wool sweater that she picked up in a thrift shop.

These days, Dacyczyn will tell you that simple living is good for the environment. In the beginning, however, her goals were more practical. She wanted to stay home, raise kids and live in a pre-1900 New England farmhouse -- "with an attached barn," she emphasized.

During the fast-living 1980s, when much of the middle class was caught up in the cycle of work and spend, Dacycyzn quit her job as a graphics artist and started living frugally. "We saw our food bill go down even as our family size went up," said Dacyczyn, know to readers of her newsletter as FZ, "The Frugal Zealot." (The food bill has bottomed out at around $40 a week, for eight.)

In less than seven years, the couple saved $49,000 on Jim's $30,000-a-year Navy salary. During this time, Jim and Amy also bought $38,000 worth of appliances, furniture and vehicles. And they put a down payment on their dream farmhouse, with attached barn.

It wasn't until later on that Amy Dacyczyn began making connections between frugality and the environment -- and, beyond that, simple justice.

"Most of what you do to save money is good for the environment. You're consuming less. You're buying secondhand. You're using something that somebody else would throw away. You're eating less convenience food, so there's a whole lot less packaging," said Dacyczyn, 37.

In their household of eight, she added, "We fill up less than one trash bag a month."

With the success of her newsletter ($12 for a yearly subscription) -- and of The Tightwad Gazette book, issued earlier this year by Villard Books, ($9.95) -- the Dacyczyns no longer need to squeeze every dollar. Jim, 42, has retired from the Navy and looks after the household as Amy tends to the newsletter, started three years ago.

"We are now financially independent," she said. Yet, this has not freed them from the disciplines of frugality.

During a recent visit, on a drizzly day, Dacyczyn had her laundry strung up across the attic of the farmhouse. Hanging out four loads a week -- rather than using the electric dryer -- saves about $100 a year, she estimates. The floor lamp in their living room was discovered while trash-picking -- "It takes a certain amount of self-confidence to do that," she conceded.

So what are they doing with all the money?

"There doesn't seem to be any problem in getting rid of it. There are plenty of people with needs," Dacyczyn said.

The couple bought a fixer-upper house to rent out to a woman in this small town who was living in a shelter with her three children. The Dacyczyns' newfound prosperity has also allowed them to help out older relatives and give to environmental causes, as well as pay off the farmhouse.

Aside from good works, Dacyczyn believes that the frugal way is also a sane way to raise her children, ages 2 to 10. She calls it "creative deprivation," based on the theory that beyond a certain point, the more things you give to children, the less they appreciate. "One of the things that pleases me about my children is that they're still impressed by simple things, like ice cream cones and yard sales."

Even so, she has learned the hard way that not everyone is ready to plug into the frugal life-style.

Appearing on the "Donahue" show recently, she suggested using a greater to scrape the burned bottom off a cookie, instead of just throwing the cookie away. "And the audience just thought it was disgusting," Dacyczyn recounted.

Even the hometown folks are wary. "People I come in contact with never ask me how I spend so little on the food bill," she admitted , showing a little hurt pride.

None of this, however, is likely to discourage a tightwad with a mission. Dacyczyn intends to go on preaching the gospel of frugality -- though she has, so far, resisted the temptation to literally do so among the faithful of Leeds Community Church, the Presbyterian congregation to which she and Jim belong.

She especially wants to send a message to those who think it's impossible to live on only one paycheck. "I want to be out there saying, 'No, it is possible!'" said The Frugal Zealot.