While many people understand the value of prepping and stocking up on important items that can enable them to survive a disaster, a significant portion of those same people are very limited in what they can do based on what their budget is. Remember that we all have the same basic expenses of home mortgages/apartment rent, monthly car payments, heat, electricity, health insurance, and whatever else we need to live.
However, just because your budget is extremely tight doesn’t mean that you can’t prep. It just means that you have to find less expensive options to do so (for now). One of the least expensive options possible for buying survival items is going to be buying them from the dollar store.
While it is true that the overwhelming majority, if all, of dollar stores in America don’t have a sporting goods section per se, they still sell items in other categories that can just as easily be applied to a multitude of different survival uses. Is the quality of these items going to be at the same level of what you would expect from a normal grocery store? Probably not, but then again these items only cost a dollar each and they will still work well for your purposes.
To help you get started, we have ten of the best items that you can buy for survival from the dollar store:
BAKING SODA
Baking soda is one of the most versatile products that you can have for survival and prepping related purposes, especially when it comes to personal hygiene and cleaning purposes. With a mixture of baking soda, water, and some other ingredients you can make your own homemade soap, shampoo, deodorant, and toothpaste. When baking soda comes into direct contact with your skin without any other products, it can reduce body odor. You can even use it to clean the dishes by adding it to your dishwasher.
Many survival experts believe that baking soda is a must have item as a prepper, and that you would be wise to stock up on it in bulk. You can buy a box of it for only one dollar at a dollar store, which means you can buy bulks of it for a very cheap price.
BANDANA
The bandana is one of those handy dandy items that many people don’t think twice about. Having 2-3 bandanas in your bug out bag or survival kit will make your survival efforts significantly easier than they already are. Think about it. You can use a bandana as a sling for broken arm, as a tourniquet over an open wound, to soak in water and then hold to your head to treat a migraine headache, to wipe your glasses, to clean your guns, or to use as a napkin. These are just a small handful of ideas for what you can use a bandana for, so the next time you visit a dollar store be sure to pick one or two up.
BATTERIES
Batteries are stored in packets of 2-4 at most dollar stores. An assortment of different types and sizes of batteries is an absolute necessity for survival, because it’s the only thing that will power any of your electronic equipment that is, well, battery powered. You shouldn’t expect to buy the most recognizable brands at dollar stores, such as Energizer or Duracell, but you can expect to buy packets of different kinds of batteries that will perform almost as well as those brands.
DUCT TAPE
No survival kit is complete without at least one roll of duct tape, without exception. It’s simply the best item to have for repairing tents, bug out bags, or anything else that has been torn or ripped. Furthermore, you can also use it to help construct a shelter, to wrap a splint around a broken limb, to fasten a knife to the end of a long stick to create a spear, and to tie people up around a tree.
GLOW STICKS
Glow sticks are great lighting devices to have for quick applications or for when your flashlights fail. They come in a multitude of different colors in dollar stores and are readily available. Any colors work great for seeing in the dark except for red, which is typically more dim or limited when it comes to lighting a large enough area.
HAND SANITIZER
Personal hygiene will be more important in a survival or disaster scenario than it is now, because sanitation standards are going to drop significantly. Having a bottle of hand sanitizer in your survival kit or one in every room at your house will remind you to sanitize your hands before touching food that you put in your mouth. Due to the alcohol in hand sanitizer, it also catches a flame very easily and can get a fire going for you in no time so long as you have an actual fire starter. Both pocket sized bottles and the larger containers are available at most dollar stores.
LIGHTERS
We just mentioned that in order to start a fire with hand sanitizer, you’ll need an actual fire starter to create the initial spark or flame. What’s better for this purpose than a lighter? While they may only be the simple Bic lighters, most dollar stores do carry lighters at their checkout stations and sometimes even sell them in bulks of four to six.
PARACORD
Need to construct a shelter? Or ascend or descend a steep cliff? Or maybe you need to tie a splint around a broken limb. Or maybe you need something that you can use as fishing line. Paracord effortlessly fulfills each of these purposes in addition to many more applications. You should expect to find at least smaller strands of paracord-type material at most dollar stores.
PONCHO
If a dollar store is selling an emergency poncho, it’s going to be the thin and cheap kind that is really only good for one or two uses. But that’s better than nothing and remember that you can buy more than one since they’re only a dollar each. A poncho isn’t just good for protecting you from the rain while you travel, the colorful ones can also be used to signal pilots in the sky when spread out over a clear and open area.
SEWING KIT
A sewing kit is a necessity in a bug out bag because it can allow you to repair rips and tears in your clothing or tent, or to tend to open wounds. The sewing kits sold at dollar stores are very basic, but again, they work better than nothing.
Recent Posts
So 2020 was a rough year. We saw massive hurricanes, including one spot in the Gulf Coast that was stuck by two different hurricanes mere days from one another. We also witnessed one of the...
When many people get into prepping, they commonly focus on fantasies about the end of the world and building a bug-out bag to help prepare them. But the truth is these scenarios only come...