Jill Duggar Proves She Hasn’t Forgotten Her Family’s Thrifty Ways on Shopping Trip With Cousin Amy
Jill Duggar might be breaking with some of her family’s traditions, but there’s at least one Duggar family habit she’s sticking with. The ex-Counting On star proved she hasn’t forgotten her family’s love of a good deal when she and Amy Duggar went on a thrift store shopping spree.
Jill Duggar hits the thrift store
Though there are rumors Jill is on the outs with some members of her large family, there’s one relative with whom she seems to have a strong relationship: her cousin Amy Duggar. On Aug. 31, Jill — whose oldest son Israel recently started kindergarten — and Amy spent the day hanging out at a thrift store in Springdale, Ark.
Both women loaded up their carts with plenty of finds, including books, clothes, and toys. The pair both documented their trip on Instagram Stories. “Shop ’til you drop,” Jill captioned one of her Stories.
Jill sticks by the Duggar family motto
Jill’s love of thrift shopping likely goes back to her childhood. After all, her family’s unofficial motto has always been “buy used and save the difference.”
With 19 kids, Jill’s parents Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar were always looking for ways to stretch their dollars a bit further. They found plenty of creative ways to save cash, from doing at-home haircuts to buying food in bulk to making their own laundry detergent. But one of their favorite strategies for staying on budget is buying used whenever possible.
“An average family, they usually go to the mall and get all these expensive clothes and shoes. But my family, we just go to the thrift store,” Josiah Duggar said in a 2008 episode of 17 Kids and Counting. In that episode, Michelle and some of the Duggar boys went shopping for used shoes. They scooped up 30 pairs of shoes at a thrift shop for just $1 a pair, saving the family more than $1,000.
The Duggars live debt-free
The savings that came from buying used shoes and clothing were well worth it to the Duggars, who were committed to living debt-free.
“How do [other] people pay interest for the debt on top of making ends meet? What we’ve done is something that a lot of people don’t want to do,” Jim Bob said in an interview with Today in 2008. “It’s not keeping up with the Joneses. We’ve always driven older vehicles; we’ve never bought a new vehicle.”
“It really is freedom when you’re not under this immense pressure every month,” Michelle added.
How Jill Duggar makes her money
Though she’s married with kids of her own, Jill clearly still loves a good deal. That’s not surprising, given that her husband Derick Dillard is in law school and they have two young children.
The family hasn’t appeared on Counting On for several years, so they aren’t earning money from TLC (though Derick has hinted they were never paid for appearing on the show). Instead, Derick earns money as a GrubHub driver when he’s not busy with classes. Jill is a stay-at-home mom, but she does do sponsored Instagram posts. While we don’t know exactly how much they earn, it seems Jill is taking a lesson she learned from her parents and being smart about how she spends her money.
