Womb to Bloom - Maternity & Beyond

As I walked through the mall the week before Easter, I laughed at how stores advertised their “BIGGEST SALE OF THE SEASON!” When I looked inside, the best discount being offered was 10%. In my book, that is not much of a discount. Stores will do anything to lure you inside. My favorite is the store that advertises a “semi-annual sale” that happens six times per year. Don’t fall for the ads. Stores have sales all the time. The secret to being a savvy shopper is knowing when to buy and when to walk on by. Seasoned shoppers shop a lot a buy a little.

Best times to shop:

Winter
Round 1 - Stores begin enticing shoppers since the famous day after Thanksgiving. If you are an early riser, you may be able to get fantastic door busters which are over or sold out by 7 am. But if you are not the type that leaves home before dawn, don’t bother at all on Thanksgiving.

Round 2 - After Christmas, it is a whole new ball game. Stores start out marking merchandise down 25%. This is the time when you go out and buy the things that you absolutely have to have or the things with limited availability. If you wait a few days, the discount will grow to 50%.

Round 3 - And if you wait until after New Year’s Day, you can find sales of 75% to 90% off. Major stores such as Wal-Mart and Target mark down all of their holiday merchandise up to 90% off by the third week of the New Year.  This merchandise includes: seasonal décor, gift sets, and any other holiday themed items.

Spring
Dress clothes go on clearance after Easter. The weekend before Easter, stores have decent specials that are worth taking advantage of, but you will have to fight the last minute crowd. And you will definitely be looking through picked over racks of clothes. Wait until after Easter, and like me, you can buy that beautiful $80 dress you’ve been eyeing for Mother’s Day for a mere $11.

Summer
Stores begin to make way for their back to school stuff during the middle of the summer. They are also getting rid of their left-over formal attire. Stores like JC Penney will have racks of clothes for a couple of dollars. Even Ann Taylor Loft marks a few racks of clothes priced under $10 during the summer.

Fall
Early in the fall, you can purchase an array of school and office supplies for pennies on the dollar. Glue, crayons, tape, paper and folders are just some of the many items you can buy at discount prices.

Tips on stocking up:
When you find good sales, it is important to make sure you shop with a purpose. Buying things only because they are on sale can lead to overspending and hoarding.

Even if you find an amazing deal, only purchase items that you are actually going to use or give away.

After the holidays, my husband and I go Christmas shopping for the following year. We have fun bargain hunting from store to store, calling and finding out when the new mark-downs are taking place. Last year, I paid $1 for a stainless steel coffee travel mug set after New Year’s Day, which I gave to my dad on Father’s Day.

An enormous make-up set that I gave to my niece for her graduation cost me only $2.00. For her birthday, I gave my mother-in-law a foot spa set, complete with organic slippers, which cost me just $5.00. None of these gifts had any holiday print anywhere on them, but they were part of the holiday merchandise, therefore they were marked down 90%. We keep the items in our “gift closet” and pull them out during the year as needed.

The convenience of not having to do last minute shopping combined with the steals, make this system worth a try. A little extra change in one hand a great gift in the other, you will never be caught empty handed.