Belts I own today: 1 - black leather (only worn with suits)

2 - casual brown leather (jeans, slacks, etc)

1 - nice brown leather (suits, jeans+blazer, etc)

1 - nylon (hiking pants)

I currently have 14 pairs of shoes, but about half of those really should be thrown away and I just keep around for wearing on rainy days or in the garden.

I'm something similar. I have more pairs of shoes--like you a number of them are really worn out ones for gardening etc.--but a decent chunk of them are specialized boots for hiking in various different conditions or boating shoes.

Author here. I might very well be the outlier :) These remarks help break my bubble and put things in a broader perspective. For context, I'm a 41-year-old father of two, living and working in central Helsinki, Finland.

Working in Canada one summer, I recall people often asking why I had some many shoes :)

As to the rather large amount of clothes, some items are at my summer house (most Finns have a summer house to go hide in). This inflates total inventory.

Well people who live in milder climates do not understand the needs of harsher/more varied climate ;-)

I have been living for a few years in SE Asia - happy times - shorts, t-shirts and flip-flops mostly.

But here in Central Europe (Poland) where we really have 5-6 seasons (early Spring being different from Spring and early Fall from late Fall) and the amount of clothing and shoes you need is insane.

You generally need different type of shoes/pants for each season and then at least a double (nice ones and ordinary ones). So different shoes/pants/jackets/etc. for strong Winter, mild Winter, early Spring and late Spring, early Fall and late Fall, hot Summer and rainy Summer etc. It accumulates even of you are not wearing all in one year.

I have a similar thing with razor blades. I'm honestly baffled when I see commercials for Dollar Shave Club and they talk how they deliver shaving products, including razors, to you each month.

When I started to shave around age 17, I got one of these Gillette 5-blade razors, and it came with two replacement heads in the same box. When those were worn out, I bought a 10-pack of replacement heads. I'm now 31 years old and I'm now halfway through that same 10-pack.

I think it depends how coarse and plentiful your facial hair is. Mine is thick, dense, and fast-growing. Before I grew a beard, I shaved every day, and one of those five-blade razors would last about a week before it blunted and became uncomfortable to use. That gets expensive fast, so I switched to an old-fashioned safety razor.

Are you sure you can buy a 10-pack of these today, made to the same specifications as then? I think of more planned obsolesence here.

If I find in 10 years that the next pack of replacement heads does not fit with my current razor handle, I'll just buy a new handle. Doesn't matter.

I think he's the outlier. Most people I know own 2 belts; one for casual clothes, one for dress pants. Shoes is normally casual shoes, work boots/dress shoes, hiking boots/running shoes, plus flip-flops or slippers. I think I've only met one man who had that many shoes, and he was really into fashion and collecting sneakers, so he had probably 50 different pairs to make sure he always had some that matched his outfit.

I think his belts alone cost more than my entire wardrobe.