Hi! It’s almost time for the annual festival of commerce we refer to as “The Holiday Season,” which means you’re all thinking super-hard about what presents to buy for those near & dear to your hearts. As we do every year, there’ll be a bevy of kickass Holiday Shopping Guides over the next few weeks, but a lot of you have asked for a central location from which to access the various affiliate accounts that enable you to support us while guiding your own shopping. Why give money to corporations when you can give money to corporations who give money to us?
Of course, the best thing of all is to give money to independent local businesses, but when that’s not possible, our affiliate accounts enable you to support THIS independent small business while shopping online. We have a ton of “affiliate accounts” at various online merchants. Basically this means that we get a kickback for everything you buy via a link on this website and whenever possible, our posts are affiliate linked to enable that. It doesn’t even need to be the product we mentioned! So. Bookmark this page!
Amazon & Open Sky & RedBubble & Fab
We are a small independently-owned women-owned business and the revenue we generate via Amazon Associates is pretty substantial and we’re oh-so-grateful when, if you plan to shop there, that you do so via Autostraddle.
So, shop at Amazon.com using this link, or click here:
You can also shop at Amazon UK using this link or Amazon CA using this link.
Shop at Fab.com by clicking here:
Shop at Open Sky (a really cool site I just discovered last week!) using this link, or click here: Shop at RedBubble by using this link, or click here:
+
BOOKS
If you’re buying books from overseas, shop at The Book Depository using this link, or click here: 
Shop at Alibris by clicking here: 
Shop at Alibris UK by clicking here, and shop at Indiebound by clicking here.
CLOTHING & APPAREL
Modcloth using this link, or click here: 
I got a Lucky Dog Double Weave Cuff two years ago and have worn it every single day since, it’s awesome. Shop at (lesbian-owned) *Lucky Dog Leather* using this link, or click here: 
Shop at Stylefly using this link, or click here:
Shop at Junk Food Clothing using this link.
Shop at Koshka with this link or by clicking here:
Shop at Torrid using this link, or click here: Shop at Topman using this link, or click here:
Shop at Busted Tees using this link, or click here:
Shop at 80stees.com by clicking here:
Shop at LOVE/inlovewithfashion using this link, or click here: Shop at Karmaloop using this link, or click here:
Shop at Alternative Apparel using this link or by clicking here:
Shop at Love & Pride using this link, or click here: Shop at Swarovski using this link, or click here:
Shop at Claire’s by clicking here:
Shop at HisRoom using this link or by clicking here:
MEDIA/MUSIC/ENTERTAINMENT
You can shop the mega-gay catalog at the lesbian-owned Wolfe Video by clicking here.
Shop at iTunes using this link, or click here: 
You can also shop at iTunes Canada using this link.
Shop at RetroPlanet by clicking here: Shop at MovieGoods using this link, or click here:
Shop at Gamestop using this link, or click here:
Shop at Groupon by clicking here: Shop at Stupid.com by clicking here:
SEX
Shop at (lesbian-owned) Babeland using this link, or click here: Shop at Good Vibrations using this link, or click here:
BEAUTY/BATH/ETC.
Shop at Beauty.com using this link, or click here: 
Shop at Bliss using this link, or click here: 
Shop at The Body Shop Canada using this link, or click here: 
Shop at The Body Shop US using this link, or click here: 
Shop at Ricky’s using this link.
Shop at mark. using this link, or click here: Shop at C.O Bigelow using this link, or click here:
HOME & FOOD
Shop at Dormify using this link, or click here: Shop at World Market using this link, or click here:
Shop at epicurious using this link:
Shop at Mighty Leaf Tea using this link, or click here:
Shop at Midwest Supplies using this link, or click here:
Shop at The Cook’s Garden using this link
, or click here:
Shop at Starbucks by clicking here: Shop at Utrecht Art Supplies using this link or by clicking here:
Donate to Charity Water using this link or click here:
TRAVEL
CheapOStay:
CarRentals.com:
Hostel Bookers:
Cheap-O Air:
Hotwire:
It makes me so sad every time anyone promotes Amazon for buying books, BUY FROM YOUR LOCAL BOOKSTORES PEOPLE. We are so nice!
caitlyn thanks for the reminder, but the point of this particular post is how people can support autostraddle this season, and amazon happens to have a great affiliate program that’s helped us pay the bills for over 3 years. in other posts where the focus isn’t on supporting autostraddle specifically, we’ve always reminded people to shop locally whenever possible.
also for what it’s worth, some people don’t have access to local bookstores, or the funds required to pay their (usually) higher prices. speaking for myself, there wasn’t a local bookstore within at least 50 miles of my hometown, so online shopping — especially for the kinds of books we recommend on AS — would’ve been extremely important for me if it had been available when i lived there. i do shop at my local bookstore (changing hands in tempe!) but i think it’s important to remember that not everyone has the privilege of living near stores like this and there’s no reason to make those people feel alienated or like they’re doing something wrong because they don’t have access to our local shopping club.
There’s a link to Indiebound up there too, if you’d like to support us AND independent bookstores at the same time!
personally, i buy most of my books on amazon used, from independent booksellers who have amazon stores. it’s not ideal, but we do need to stay in business too and this is a way to do that. hopefully one day that won’t be the case, but we’ll never get there otherwise.
I work for an independent bookstore that sells books online, and our Amazon sales are the vast majority of our sales. Without Amazon, we wouldn’t make enough money selling online for it to be worthwhile. Honestly, I’m not a big fan of Amazon either, but it’s not as simple as Amazon vs Independent Bookstores. Independent bookstores sell on Amazon because it is the largest database of books, and because it lends credibility to a small company with no name recognition.
No, cool, I get the point of the article as a whole; just voicing the fact that Amazon launched an attack on Independent bookstores last year trying to make us disappear, and I have worked at an independently owned bookstore for two years now; so it’s upsetting to me when a site I love promotes a massive company I am so very against. Love all of you still anyways.
I love independent bookstores, but the ones where I used to live were super limited in what they carried. No feminist books, no queer books or authors. And much higher prices than online.
Same, theres nothing more peaceful to me than browsing a bookstore for an hour. I rarely find what I came in for though, and its understandable why because a physical store just doesn’t have the space : /
i agree with you, but just want to point out it’s often because of low demand. my family owns a used bookstore and we had a nice section with feminist books for two years, and it probably had two sales. so it was removed. unfortunate, but it wasn’t making any money.
i’m sure our selection was not the best, but then again, no one was bringing any feminist books (or Queer!) in either, which is how we get the majority of our books.
so I totally get what you’re saying and agree with you, i just think often the supply and demand is not enough.
It’s great that people want to support Autostraddle, but can we take a moment to ask why we are advocating consumption?
Given the environmental and economic state in our country and the world, buying more stuff is the wrong answer. Buying more stuff on Black Friday is worse yet.
Please think twice before participating in the gross consumerism of Black Friday and the ‘holiday season’.
we’re not “advocating consumption,” we’re advocating getting us a kickback if you already plan to consume in the first place, which most people do around this time of year. you certainly don’t have to — and if you don’t plan on shopping online in the holiday season, i’m not sure why you read this post to begin with? we’ll have lots of posts on home-made gifts and stuff coming up!
i agree with your ideals, i do! i really do. but i have to be practical because people work here who need to get paid. i work on this site and this community 80 hours a week and have done so for 3.5 years. we’re a small independent business owned by queer women, staffed by queer women, doing everything we can to stay afloat and support the women who work for us as best we can. we don’t censor our content, we don’t answer to a larger corporation (like all the other sites do), we only advocate things we believe in, and we’re very loyal to our readers. we want to grow and continue enhancing this community that has changed so many lives. in order to do that, we need to make money, and making money involves things like advertising, affiliate purchases, and selling merch. we’ve turned down heaps of offers because we didn’t agree with their ideals and are unwilling to change to suit their company’s demands. we aim to find ethical compromises that will meet our practical needs without making us feel like we’ve sold our souls to the devil. this is one of them.
otherwise we just run out of money and shut down, making one less queer voice on the internet. i don’t feel like that’s a good solution, either.
“i agree with your ideals, i do! but i have to be practical…” is an admission of hypocrisy.
If autostraddle would like to stick to their ideals, why readers to engage in wasteful consumption and support tax-evading corporations (Amazon, Topshop, Starbucks), shops that racially profile customers and ban trans*people dressing rooms (Macy’s), etc.?
Instead, how about an article on how to support autostraddle Without consuming stuff from corporations, for example:
– gift donations
– gift A-camp dues
– sell instructions for interesting, queer do-it-yourself gifts
– sell recipes
– autostraddle premium memberships
– even start an autostraddle barter system where autostraddle takes a cut
we actually do a lot of those things and post about them a lot! we pull income from a lot of places to form our budget, and every aspect of it is integral. premium memberships is something we’re working on. but just those things aren’t enough. affiliate sales is something easy that doesn’t take much energy/time from us, and like i said, is aimed at people who are already gonna be shopping at those places, can now do so in a slightly better way. we don’t have the resources right now to replace the income we make via affiliate sales with more time-intensive projects, such as those you mention.
also, those things all involve getting money directly from the readers all the time. we promised after our last fundraising campaign that we wouldn’t do another donation drive like that again, that we wanted to be self-sustainable. lots of readers can’t afford to donate or buy a t-shirt or a membership or go to camp, but can afford to simply click a link on this page when getting their mom a christmas present they were already planning to buy. (also some things on your list wouldn’t actually be profitable, if i understand them correctly, but that’s another conversation for another day)
honestly, i totally respect your decision not to support consumerism. i won’t tell you what to do. in return, i hope you can respect the amount of time and energy that i put into this site and community, and not tell me that you know how to run my business better than i do. with all due respect, it’s easy for you to say those things, you don’t know what it’s like on this end.
*also, i didn’t know that about macy’s. i’ve removed their link from this page.
I just bought a fuckton of Christmas presents from Babeland..For myself! And I clicked the link above to do so! And I remembered Ali’s advice that “you can never have enough lube!” So I went back and added a fuckton of that too! And, and I used the Autostraddle discount provided in an earlier post! Giving back to Autostraddle has never felt so good!
yay!!! Babeland commissions are the best of all of them, btw, so that is awesome. and they’re an independent lesbian-owned business, too! :-)
YOU ARE CORRECT, YOU CAN NEVER HAVE ENOUGH LUBE! YOU WIN!
Just a note on Macy’s: I don’t know about the racial profiling thing, but with regard to “banning trans* persons from dressing rooms,” that was one employee at a Macy’s and she was fired for it: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/07/macys-employee-fired-transgender_n_1133831.html
It’s a logical fallacy to imply that Autostraddle in any way increases the amount of consumerism in this community by providing links to consume MORE RESPONSIBLY. Just doesn’t make sense. I bet everyone who was gonna buy someone a winter present was going to do so regardless of this post.
Additionally, if you would like to run such programs, come to Autostraddle with a plan and offer to run them, on a volunteer basis, like most of the people otherwise trying to make money. Otherwise, please get off your high horse.
FOUR FOR YOU.
With all due respect, I think you are underestimating the value of this site being completely free for its users. In my opinion, if they were to start charging to read certain articles, access features etc it would alienate a large percentage of its readers, and probably the people that these articles are written for in the first place.
I’m amazed at the standard of ‘product’ they have managed to produce with such a low income, I think that goes un-noticed sometimes.
I do 99% of my shopping online for a million reasons and will be glad to use the links so autostraddle can make a few quid (or dollars , right?) at the same time. I buy a ridiculous amount of shoes online… I mean a ridiculous amount… so you should see a steady increase in your income ladies! And please to god don’t answer back with “if you care so much about what they’re doing, why don’t you NOT buy those shoes and spend that money on a donation”…. Erm….. no… fuck off… I love shoes.
AND FOUR FOR YOU TOO. I’m sorry, I couldn’t contain my enthusiasm just be clicking the + button.
Yes because all consumption is bad, especially when it leads to the lovely ladies that run this site being able to pay rent and consume food.
Not all consumption is bad.
And if everyone were to stay totally true to their ideals, as a poor grad student I’d probably be broke because things that are organic, or from independent stores, or whatever, tend to cost a little more. And Autostraddle wouldn’t be free – which might be fine with you, but I’m guessing would not be fine with the majority of our readers. Speaking for myself, if I had to pay to access the content here, I never would have become a regular commenter here – and now I’m a writer here! I’m very pleased to have had the experience to have my writing seen by such a huge audience and on such an amazing website and I never would have even been able to see how amazing it was if I had had to pay for it in the beginning (because I’m broke and only have money for a Spotify Premium account and that’s it – I don’t even have Hulu Plus or Netflix).
I just think this is worth repeating: “…we’re advocating getting us a kickback if you already plan to consume in the first place, which most people do around this time of year. you certainly don’t have to”.
Get off your high horse.
Is This Consumerism? PROBLEMATIC.
“in this picture, a woman is buying an organic vegan cupcake from a mobility impaired grandmother who speaks Yiddish at a farmer’s market. Is This Consumerism? The vegan and organic nature of the cupcake highlights class privilege, and the ironic choice of a nutritionless cupcake is a deliberate slight t all those who cannot afford healthy food. The farmer’s market, once welcoming to the working classes, has now been appropriated by middle class Americans and the disabled Yiddish grandmother represents the exoticising of the Other. PROBLEMATIC”
Is this a reference to something? I’m not understanding.
http://develop.autostraddle.com/is-this-feminist-reveals-what-is-really-problematic-138314/
I don’t really understand your meaning, if people don’t buy things then other people will lose their jobs, how is shopping bad for the economy?
does it work from the uk?
I buy shit loads, and I mean SHIT LOADS from itunes and amazon… but your linky-winkys take me to the .com and I’m more of a .co.uk kinda girl.
let me look into this!
I figured it out, and set us up with amazon uk. you can support autostraddle while shopping at Amazon UK using this link!
I can’t find anything for itunes yet, but also worth noting is that the book depository is based in the UK!
that’s great, thanks for looking into it so fast… I mean I know theres a time difference and all…but shit that was quick.
Hey, Riese understands that the need for cute shoes demands immediate attention. So go forth and populate that shoe closet. And let me know if and when you find something super cute! I’m always up for adding to my own footwear collection!
Hi Riese,
Could you please set up an Amazon.ca one, too? I know I can order them from the .com site, but my books will get to me faster/cheaper that way.
With many thanks from north of the 49th parallel, both for this and all the work you do. :)
ta-da! Amazon Dot CA
Merci mille fois!
My brother wants a bunch of books from the Book Depository so I got so excited when I saw that :) Also Modcloth because there is never not something I want from Modcloth.
I was going to say the same thing, I have bought stuff from at least four of these places in the last month, didn’t cross my mind to do it through Autostraddle/didn’t know you could. I will from now on!
Whoops forgot to ask, do you have a UK Topman link too? Cheers
unfortunately, no… we applied to their program but they rejected us.
can I ask why?
we get rejected from like half of the affiliate programs we apply to. they never tell us why. sometimes i think they don’t understand where their products would fit into our site because they’re stupid and don’t look hard enough to see that just ’cause we’re not a dedicated [xxx] blog, we don’t write about [xxx]. other times i’m pretty sure we get rejected b/c we talk about sex.
I’m willing to put £50 on betting that within the next 5 years you are approached by them asking you to advertise toppers on autostraddle.com
standard.
I will be buying gifts online, so this is the coolest thing. I will also be gluing sh*t together. Autostraddle will be all up in my holiday gift giving.
thank you Ellie!!
I sent the link to my family members so they can buy me things and support my fave website. I am going to give my Kwanzaa gift to Autostraddle this year. where is the I just want to donate link?
awww! it’s in the sidebar, the yellow badge that says “donate to help keep us going”
Perfect!
Thanks Riese for everything you do.. it’s easy to give advice when you’re on the other side!
<3
aww thanks for the heart.. keep doing what you’re doing.. :)
hugs and love and light from nyc!
i have already started forming a christmas list with these stores in mind SO
ah yay, thanks for the amazon uk link – i was going to ask about that!! will definitely be using it a ton now for books. i had been using the book depository link before but a lot of times the amazon used section is a lot cheaper. thanks for everything as always, riese!
thank YOU!
Mindless consumerism sucks…but SHOPPING VIA AUTOSTRADDLE AFFILIATE LINKS = MINDFUL CONSUMERISM. This Christmas season I will do all of my shopping via Autostraddle affiliate links and will be super happy about being a mindful consumer who supports women, queers, art, writing, and all the hard work that goes into this site.
Wait why is Charity:Water there? I mean it’s my absolute favourite charity ever, I rave about it for hours, but how does it benefit AS?
well, it actually doesn’t. but it benefits us insofar as it improves the world? this was their pitch:
Welcome to charity: water. Before you read any further we want you to know that this is unlike any other affiliate program that you have come across before. More than 700 million people around the world don’t have access to clean drinking water and we’ve set out to change that. You won’t earn any commissions from this program but you can make a real difference. We’re asking affiliates like you to help raise awareness and help spread the word by placing ads on your site for charity: water.
so, it’s hard to say no to that.
Yay brilliant. Thank you so much for doing this…the dirty water crisis breaks my heart, Charity:Water is providing real solutions to it. And they are such a brilliant charity, 100% of donations go to projects, nothing to administration.
Oh my gosh I love them, I love AS, this has made me incredibly happy. :D
you is good people.
ummm, not exactly relevant, but my first (childhood) crush ever was on Robin Hood the animated fox. which is all kinds of strange :) Thanks AS!
MINE TOO OMG!
My second was on grown-up Simba.
I had a crush on Maid Marion, in fox form of course.
See I think I just wanted to BE Maid Marion. I actually watched Robing Hood again like two weeks ago so this has been on my mind, so glad I can count on like-minded animated character loving individuals at AS to work my feels out <3
Mulan! Also, Belle.
Mulan always
Speaking of gayness and Mulan, though, always re-post: http://panasonicyouth.tumblr.com/post/20826481638/am-i-gay-a-journey-of-self-discovery-with-shang
Oh my god, I’m dying. That was the best.
i had a crush on mary martin as peter pan in the 1955 musical live-action version
Yes! me too.
unnervingly enormous crush. this statement may not be entirely past tense.
please take me to your neverland, mary martin/peter pan.
Me too! On another note, have you watched this movie lately and realized how HORRIBLY RACIST AND AWFUL it is in places and STILL loved Mary Martin… and sang along with it? Damn… childhood favourites have a way of sticking!
That movie (animated Robin Hood) is one of the best animated movies I’ve ever seen. And the turtle with glasses is so cute.
As for animated crushes, Nani the big sister from Lilo and Stitch. Haha.
My favorite fall pastime is finding Autostraddle affiliate links to items i want for Christmas and then sending those links to my Republican Mitt Romney voting relatives.
excellent idea, i will be doing this.
god bren, every day i wake up and think i could not love you more, BUT THEN.
How much information do you get about us from Amazon (or in general from the stores as a whole?)
absolutely nothing.
on amazon, we get a list of what has been purchased via affiliates, but nothing about who purchased the items themselves. as far as i’ve been able to tell, we don’t get any information at all from the other sites, just the amount of total sales and our percentage.
Do you see what we are buying when we use the link? Although I’m planning on making most of my gifts homemade this year, I will surely use the links if I buy anything online.
nope, i don’t see what you’re buying when you use the link. like i said up there, on amazon we do see a list of all the products anybody has bought via our links, but no information on who bought things at all or who bought what. that would be creepy.
‘on amazon we do see a list of all the products anybody has bought via our links’
i feel like there could be a the makings of a listicle without commentary in that.
If anyone ever buys the barrel of lube (http://www.amazon.com/Passion-Natural-Water-Based-Lubricant-Gallon/dp/B005MR3IVO) you will keep us in the loop, I trust?
THIS IS AWESOME! I spent an hour in class this morning doing nothing but rereading past Autostraddle gift guides and planning things to buy for people based on all your lovely suggestions :) This makes a lot of my plans even better bc now I can buy pretty things for lovely people and support the wonderful world of Autostraddle!
Bookmarking this in my ‘shopping’ folder for future splurging. I just got a job after nine months of unemployment, oho <3
Congratulations!
I had no idea y’all had so many affiliates. It was brilliant to put them all on one page. I will be using these links for sure! I like to make most of my gifts too, but there are a few people who just don’t love my uneven crocheted scarves as gifts every year (spoiled if you ask me). So this is perfect!
Thank you all for working so hard!
also, where is the O.B. link? Stocking stuffers, hello ;)
xo
You can get OB’s through Amazon! And you can set up a subscription so a box comes once a month or bimonthly or as often as you like! And they automatically charge you!
I am really excited about OB tampon subscriptions you guys.
Am I right in assuming that AS gets a kickback from these links all the time? I don’t just practice gross consumerism during the months of November and December and could make the effort to continually using these links, if AS keeps getting the kickback.
yup, it works year-round!
“I don’t just practice gross consumerism during the months of November and December”
comment award
awesome! i buy things from amazon a lot from work, bookmarking the link for autostraddle kickback multitasking.
AS, could you please make a nice easy button on your front page connecting us to this page throughout the holiday season? We want to help!
Super-please-and-thank-you!
An affiliates button all the time for all the things!
Yes, please! And not just for the holiday season. I don’t shop much, but when I do, I’d like to give y’all kickbacks.
Hey guys, does anyone know the logistics of how this works? Here’s my situation: I have a bunch of stuff in an existing Amazon shopping cart, that I created while not browsing through Autostraddle’s kickback link. If I close that browser tab and reopen through Autostraddle’s link, my shopping cart still exists, so I can pay for things there. Does that work for the kickback? Or does the shopping cart have to have been created in the Autostraddle window?
Sorry for the nitpick-y question, just trying to ensure that I’m helping!
I’m not an authority, but my understanding is that the item has to be accessed through the affiliate link BEFORE it goes into the cart; if it’s already in the cart, AS won’t get a kickback. But I may be wrong…
I sent an email to my friends who tend to shop online, explaining about Autostraddle, how the affiliate program works (AS gets a cut but doesn’t cost anything extra to use), and that their purchases won’t be tracked back.
Within the first hour, 3 people wrote back saying they were glad to use it and planned to shop this weekend!
In the email, I provided a compact, alphabetical list of the links — here they are:
Alibris #books
Amazon US #allthethings
Amazon UK #allthethings
Babeland #sex #lesbian-owned
Beauty.com #beauty #bath
Big Drop #clothing #apparel
Bliss #beauty #bath
The Body Shop Canada #beauty #bath
The Body Shop US #beauty #bath
The Book Depository #books
Busted Tees #clothing #apparel
C.O. Bigelow #beauty #bath
The Cook’s Garden #food #home
Cost Plus World Market #food #home
Dormify #food #home
Gamestop #entertainment #media
Good Vibrations #sex
Indiebound #books
iTunes #entertainment #media
Junk Food Clothing #clothing #apparel
Karmaloop #clothing #apparel
Love & Pride #clothing #apparel
LOVE/inlovewithfashion #clothing #apparel
Lucky Dog Leather #clothing #apparel #lesbian-owned
Midwest Supplies #food #home
Mighty Leaf Tea #food #home
Modcloth #clothing #apparel
Movie Goods #entertainment #media
Open Sky
Starbucks #food #home
Stylefly #clothing #apparel
Swarovski #clothing #apparel
Topman #clothing #apparel
Torrid #clothing #apparel
Utrecht Art Supplies #home
Thanks to whoever made all the links in my previous comment live!
What about affiliates for ThinkGeek for all the queer nerds out there? :)
https://www.thinkgeek.com/affiliates/ just screams to me to beg you!
we have applied and hopefully will be accepted!
they rejected us! i even wrote an impassioned plea, to no avail
What the hell? As a ThinkGeek fan that makes me mad… maybe they just only do affiliate programs with geek-focused sites?
so I’m not gonna buy presents for lets say about 1-3 people of my family just yet cause I’m totes expecting thm to cancel at short notice.if they do they might get some cards saying:
a donation was made in your name to autostraddle. and now might be the only appropriate time for you ever to actually say ‘That’s Gay’. because yes, this is indeed very gay.
love, L
and hey is there a amazon link working for germany?
thank you!! this is really great. while i knew about some i didn’t know about others (swarovski, modcloth). i was planning on buying myself a necklace from swarovski once i recover from moving house and christmas so for me that’s really great.
i know you’re getting a million questions like this but is the iTunes thing for all iTuneses or only the US one?
Threadless. Please get an affiliate account with Threadless?
Oh god yes! I am a (waaaay too) regular Threadless shopper, I would happily share my love of cute tshirt purchasing with AS.
If you had an ASOS affiliate link I would use the SHIT out of it.
Riese, I need you to affiliate Musicians Friend so AS can get a kickback for all the banjo gear I have to buy!
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/pages/affiliate-program
<3 you Runanmomma
Dear Autostraddle,
Have you thought about Zappos? They are where my shoes come from. http://www.zappos.com/associates-program