How to Shop the Sales Without Regretting It

Sale season is approaching and we’re here to style you properly.

Decide what you need before you look

This is the only part that really matters and almost nobody does it. Before the sales start, go through your wardrobe and work out what you are actually missing.

Write it down. Something for the office. A dress for a wedding in March. Something plain you can wear constantly. Then when everything is reduced, you are shopping against a list rather than against a feeling.

The discount is not the point

Seventy per cent off something you will never wear is still money spent. Thirty per cent off something you will wear fifty times is a genuine saving.

The useful question is never how much is it reduced. It is whether you would buy it at this price if there were no sale on at all. If the answer is no, the discount is doing the thinking for you.

Check why it is reduced

Sometimes it is a genuine end of season clearance. Sometimes it is a colour nobody wanted, or a size that was overordered, or a cut that did not work on most people.

None of that means do not buy it. It means look carefully at the thing itself rather than at the price, because there is usually a reason the shop still has it.

Size does not go on sale

The most common sale mistake is buying the wrong size because it was the last one. It will not fit better later and you will not get round to altering it.

A dress in the wrong size at seventy per cent off is money gone. Unless it is one size too big and you already intend to take it to a tailor, leave it.

Buy the boring things

Sales are the right moment for the pieces you will wear constantly, which are usually the plain ones. A well cut dress in a neutral or deep colour, something for work, the piece that goes with everything.

The striking pieces are what everybody reaches for in a sale and they are the ones that end up unworn, because you cannot wear something memorable repeatedly in front of the same people.

Sleep on anything over a certain amount

Pick a number that means something to you and apply it. Above that figure, leave it for a day before buying.

Most sale purchases are driven by the worry that it will be gone. Sometimes it is. More often it is still there the next day and you have had time to work out whether you actually wanted it.

Check what you can send back

Sale items often come with different return terms, and some are final sale with no returns at all.

Find out before you pay rather than after. If something cannot be returned, that is an argument for being more careful about size and fit, not less.

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