Sometimes you just have to laugh at yourself. I once learned a very valuable lesson in how to fail at capitalism, and I thought I would share it with you all so that you don't fall victim to the same fate. Not that you would, there aren't very many people willing to go this far for a few bars of soap, lol.

So here's the thread that I wrote on Twitter:

For those that want to read it all in one place, here's the full story of what happened:

I once drove the entire supply/demand cycle for my favorite soap on Amazon and it cost me tons of money. Here's what happened and what I learned from being a complete moron...

So there was this soap that my wife and I found at our hotel while we were on our honeymoon. It was a Bvlgari soap that smells amazing, but also reminds me of our trip, so it now has sentimental value to me. First lesson learned is don't get emotionally attached to soap, lol.

So about 5 years after our honeymoon, I went online just to see if they still made the soap. They didn't. There was only one place I could find it, on Amazon, from a shady supplier with only mediocre reviews. Second lesson, don't buy from shady suppliers with bad reviews.

The listing said they only had 20 or so packages of soap left. It was expensive ($20 for 6 bars), but I figured I'd buy a one just to have it. When the soap arrived, it was obvious that it had been stolen from a hotel or something like that, because it was not in packaging.

The soap came in a ziploc bag...obviously this was an employee at the hotel that grabbed the leftovers and started selling them online. I didn't care. It smelled amazing, and I quickly went through all 6. So I ordered another set.

This happened three or four times, until I started to notice a disturbing trend. As I bought more soap, the price kept going up. Now it was about $30 per set, and there were only 15 left. Sure enough, as I bought more, it kept going up.

At some point, I pushed so far as to get the price up above $50. I realized I was addicted to this soap, but the bigger realization was that I was single handedly the one driving up the cost. With only 10 sets remaining, we were nearing $60 per set. My wife was pissed lol.

Eventually, the cost just got too high. With 5 sets left, the price was now up to $80. I had to back out. Even with an addiction to feed, I just can't justify that cost. The soap still sits there listed on Amazon, just waiting for the one idiot that drove its price up to cave.

So what did I learn? That I'm an idiot. I drove down the supply and was the only source of demand for a product. I should have bought them all on day one for $20, which honestly is still a lot of money for 6 soaps.

Here's the current listing for those that are curious. Hope you enjoyed my story and don't make the same mistake. As consumers, sometimes we are our own worst enemy haha.

Please don't make the same mistakes that I did. Stay safe. Stay smart. And don't drive up your own costs by being a moron.