For those who live in places where you can buy and shoot off your own fireworks on the 4th of July, about how much do you spend? And what does it get you?
Fireworks are not legal in the city here, but they are in the county, so we have fireworks tents popping up all over just outside the city limits this time of year. It’s been a while since I bought fireworks for myself so I’m not sure how much people are willing to spend on lots of 'splodey stuff. My 14 year old grandson wanted to borrow some money to go buy fireworks, and when I asked him how much, he said $100! :eek: I would have grudgingly offered $50, and even that amount I think is more than enough for a young teenager. Is that unreasonable?
Fireworks are illegal where I live now but I would routinely spend over $100 every 4th of July and New Years Eve when I was a teenager over 20 years ago. Even that would not have been a good show on its own so my friends and family would pool our money and buy $300 - $500 worth for everyone. Decent fireworks are expensive and some people spend much more than that.
Fifty dollars worth of fireworks hits that irritating price point where it is enough to get started but not enough to impress anyone or have any real fun. Now that I am older, I know that the correct amount to spend on fireworks is exactly $0 because you are really just blowing up money but it sure means a lot especially to youngish men (and even some not so young).
Nothing. There are tens of thousands of dollars spent by everyone else on fireworks. I get to watch them in exchange for a couple thousand people making noise until all hours.
Last couple years about $500 each year at the indian reservation.
A teenager spending $100 at a local stand where prices are higher isn’t a crazy amount. With my kids I might have given each of the 3 kids $50 and told them to spend their own money beyond that.
We spent $155 last night at a local stand. Most of it was small stuff - little fountains, some Saturn missiles, tanks, monkey drivers and stuff like that. We got three $20 bigger fountains, and got a giant brick fountain as a freebie. We’re into smaller stuff, rather than spending $80 on one big missle that shoots up and goes bang with a shower of sparks, and then it’s over.
Zero. The town where I live has a ban on personal fireworks, plus there is a fire department and police station two blocks directly east of me. Anything worth setting off would explode above me and the embers would rain down on those two buildings. Plus I would have to drive to Wyoming to buy anything worth setting off.
I spend $0, and for that price, I get an hour-long show put on by professionals sponsored by a municipality, plus countless smaller shows sponsored by private individuals.
To the extent that anyone at all benefits from fireworks, everyone does. What difference does it make being the one to personally set them off, that justifies the cost?
Oh, and private fireworks are illegal here, but it doesn’t make one lick of difference. There are still stands everywhere, “for out-of-state use”, and the police don’t do a thing to stop anyone unless they start a fire.
Never have bought fireworks and doubt that I ever will. In fact, I can’t remember the last time I made to effort to go some place and watch fireworks. Just not my thing…
Have you ever been the one to buy $400 worth of fireworks missiles (the really big bottle rockets) and some sawed off PVC pipe for the first and only rocket launcher championship games?
Well, me and my best friend did once. They are notoriously inaccurate so the chance of hitting each other is really low but I did manage to time a shot well enough to explode a shell about 4 feet away from his head. The festivities ended when I accidentally shot a rocket that landed right in a beautiful plume of pampas grass that the town had just planted as part of a riverfront beautification project. In my defense, not all of it burned and it eventually survived because I worked hard to put the fire out. The police saw it the same way and no arrests were made.
The bottom line is that expensive fireworks are just clean fun and well worth the money as long as you manage to stay out of jail. Sitting on a lawn chair in a park somewhere watching superior fireworks displays just doesn’t give you the same thrill as the small but real chance of getting blown up personally.
Zero - they’re illegal here. That doesn’t stop the neighbors (in the cul de sac behind us) from putting on an elaborate illegal fireworks show every year. One of the families has moved away, and the other families’ kids are older now, so hopefully we’ll be spared this year. The show is kind of fun, I must admit, but cleanup is a nightmare - my pool and garden end up full of firework detritus.
This year, for the first time in like 30 years, I spent nothing. My kid’s taking summer courses at college and didn’t have time to get anything put together. But in years past we would drive up to the reservation at Tulalip and buy at least $200 worth. For that you can put on a pretty good show. Also for years my son would build a big cardboard model building, with fireworks integrated into its construction. Then we would touch that off and watch it burn and explode. Some were really well done models (the first was The Parthenon, as I recall, and later there was an excellent Lighthouse of Alexandria, complete with flashing lights at the peak).
I miss those days. It was fun, and worth every cent.