With Valentine’s Day just yesterday, it is hard to not see all of the decorations, flowers, stuffed animals and chocolate at your local convenience store. Even UW Oshkosh’s Corner Convenience Store has its’ own table full of the red goodies you can find everywhere during February.

However, I feel that this is absolutely ridiculous. Having all of these items for one specific day has caused the over commercialization of the once-special holiday.

While I do love receiving flowers from my boyfriend on Valentine’s Day, I feel that this has just become something required by the holiday and companies are jumping the gun on this prospect of Valentine’s Day by overpricing the items one usually gets for their loved one.

It has gotten so bad that the candy one buys for their loved ones is now overpriced and in cheaper packaging than ever. The day after Valentine’s Day turns into half-priced-candy day and whatever was not bought the week before now is brought home by singles who want to ‘eat their feelings’ or college students who are smart enough to leave campus for good, cheap candy.

Candy isn’t the only thing that is overpriced for the holiday. Cards, for both the kindergarteners and adults, are extremely overpriced.

I remember going to Walmart to pick out my valentines for my class celebration, wanting only the best which always came with stickers. However, I was never able to get the ones that came with candy or smelly stickers because of how overpriced these pieces of thick paper were.

Moral of the story, the valentines my sister is now buying for her own class celebration are equally overpriced pieces of thick paper with Moana on them. Although these pieces of paper are expensive, these are only the ones meant for children.

When it comes to getting a card for your significant other, which is a crappy gift to begin with, companies have spiked the prices on these cards undoubtedly. Instead of a $3 card you would normally get for some other holiday, these are now closer to five dollars.

Sophomore Brett Spangler said he agrees Valentine’s day is commercialized, but also says that it is what you make of the holiday.

“Yeah, it’s definitely commercialized,” Spangler said. “But it is also what you make of it because not everyone buys the stuff.”

While not everyone may buy these items, our social expectations have created these expectations of getting something from your significant other, and it has truly gotten out of control.

Freshman Rachel Medley argued these gifts are becoming over-the-top and overpriced. She said she feels simpler gifts or events are the way to go.

“The day has been overly- glamorized by incentivizing over-the-top gifts and events in order to make money,” Medley said. “I would argue for simpler gifts and events.”

Then we get to newest fad of buying ridiculously huge things for your significant other, which is even more money out of your pocket. Realistically, the huge cards you can buy end up being a better deal then the smaller, overpriced ones because of the total amount of paper, but the companies are making them so large that all you end up doing with them is throwing them out or burning them.

The overly-large stuffed animals you can find in crates at Walmart are also becoming excessive. No girl living in the dorms has room for that on her bed because we are already living in such a compact space.

While those large boxes of chocolate do get eaten, but at what cost? That is a lot of sugar to be eating, and by buying these large, overpriced, commercialized items you are doing exactly what the companies want you to do.

Additionally, there are no other holiday that supports the large stuffed animal fad. It is only Valentine’s Day and that is because companies tie in the idea that the bigger the gift, the more you love the person.

This idea that, “The more you get for your loved one the better” is becoming the center of Valentine’s Day. The more you spend, the more these items are going to go up in price.

While the items you get for this wonderful holiday are usually tasteful, don’t let the over-commercialization of the holiday trick you into buying the excessive things you and your loved one don’t need.