over a period of six weeks, as part of Out of pocket seriesGlobal News investigates how inflation is affecting Canadians from coast to coast.
Lise LeBlanc was a mother of two, managing a single-income household, when she founded the nonprofit and Facebook group Mom Jeans.
“I just took out an extra piece of debt — I just bought a new couch, pay it later now. I was like, ‘What am I doing?’ I already had debt, I was like, ‘This is so stupid,'” said LeBlanc, who is from Saskatoon.
The group often participates in ‘no spend’ challenges, where members are encouraged to buy nothing, and hold biweekly clothing swaps to promote less spending on clothing.
“It kind of started as this debt challenge, ‘Let’s motivate each other to get out of debt,’ and it’s really turned into this whole community group,” LeBlanc said.
“People realized really quickly that it was a safe place to talk about their problems and ask questions that they might not feel comfortable asking their families or asking in public.”
LeBlanc began specializing in helping women who had recently separated from their partners and were learning to balance single-income families, but more recently, she’s seeing that inflation,
Statistics Canada said that in 2022, grocery prices in Canada are set to rise at the fastest pace since 1981, with prices in Saskatchewan increasing by an average of 6.6 per cent.
“As far as inflation is concerned, groceries are the biggest thing,” LeBlanc said. “In our house, we really stick to the basics: rice, beans, produce on sale, and frozen produce. We don’t buy meat or dairy products; that’s really expensive.
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While wages were rising late last year, they haven’t kept up with increases in the cost of living.
When Samantha Schneider joined Mom Jeans, she took on an informal leadership role with respect to fundraising and organizing support for members.
“We started organizing clothing drives and grocery drives for the members,” said Schneider.
They hosted biweekly clothing swaps and offered things to other members of the group before throwing some away.
“There are so many ways to reduce waste. Every bit goes a long way for a lot of these guys and a lot of these women,” said Schneider.
Mom Jeans now offers emergency funds and microloans to members to discourage credit card use.
“We look at their income, we give them an amount that we think is fair for them to pay back and give them a fairly generous payment term and it’s all based on trust,” LeBlanc explained.
He said the group has experienced 100 percent repayment since the program began.
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Calleigh Farkas, a two-year member of Mom Jeans from Martensville, Sask., said Mom Jeans came into her life at the perfect time.
“I was in the midst of a separation, grieving the loss of my mother and raising a two-year-old and six-month-old,” Farkas said.
In May of 2021, Farkas experienced an unexpected car problem that resulted in $1,000 in repairs.
“We’re very anti-credit card,” LeBlanc said. “It puts a lot of people in trouble and has a lot of members who are living their way out of credit card debt.”
Mom Jeans was able to offer Farkas money from an emergency fund created by the group to repair his car.
“It really helps,” Farkas said. “Help was clearly needed. I was still a student at the time and had student loans.
LeBlanc explained that Mom Jeans members often discuss how scary and uncertain it feels to be responsible for a huge pile of debt.
At the time of founding Mom Jeans in 2019, LeBlanc worked as an administrative assistant earning approximately $42,000 per year. After the mortgage payment, daycare, and monthly bills, he explained, there was very little left at the end of each month.
He had accumulated a debt of about $53,000.
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“When I decided I needed to make a change, I was all in.”
She started donating plasma twice a week, selling things from her household, and taking whatever odd jobs she could find.
LeBlanc paid off $52,905 in debt in 20 months using Dave Ramsey’s ‘debt snowball’ method.
“You pay the minimum balance on all of your loans and put a little extra into the smallest loan. Once that loan is paid off, you take the amount you were paying into that, plus a little excess, and add that amount to your second-smallest loan and so on until the loan is gone,” explains LeBlanc.
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“My approach works for me, but won’t work for everyone,” she said. “Those who prefer the slow and gentle approach are valid, and can also be done low and slow.”
The Facebook page is accepting new members but will remain private to protect the vulnerability of some who post.
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