Sample Sale

I'm a huge fan of Sophie Kinsella's "Shopaholic" book series (and, well, everything else Sophie Kinsella writes too).  In "Shopaholic Takes Manhattan", Becky Bloomwood gets her first taste of a "sample sale"; designer clothes, marked down, secret locations, the whole deal.

This morning, Quin and I got our first taste of a sample sale as well.

It was a designer sample sale, with a lot of jeans and then a variety of designer tops, jackets and sweaters.  The first thing that I found HILARIOUS?  How very expensive it all still was!  Mostly because I rarely shop designer for anything, and much prefer heading down to the outlet malls in the States to shop as cheaply as I possibly can.  I have nice stuff, I just don't have over the top name brand stuff.  So, the jeans were out for me right away.  Sure, they were super high quality, but I'm not buying $198 jeans (that's AFTER THE DISCOUNT)!  I cringe when I pay $50 for jeans, even though that's typically an okay price for "good" jeans since it's hard enough to find great fitting jeans anywhere anyway!  So, the prices made me giggle, since I'm such a discount girl in the first place.

It was fun though, to sort through the piles of designer clothes and see what you could find.  I didn't walk away empty handed.  They had a whole bunch of Bench brand stuff, and Bench is just SO DAMN EXPENSIVE, and yet so comfortable and fun, that I couldn't resist.  I did get a deal, based on Bench original prices.  I ended up with two hoodies (which will look great with jeans for Friday work days -- jeans I will be buying at American Eagle or somewhere else later on, haha).  I got them at half of their original price.  I also got a really nice black fall jacket (also Bench), that's light and looks great on.  It was a bit pricey, but again better than what you'd typically pay for Bench in the Bench store.  I also always have trouble finding jackets that I feel confident wearing and that are actually somewhat stylish, so I don't mind paying for a more expensive brand just to get something that's actually nice.

So, my first designer sample sale! Still an expensive venture, but if you DO like designer brands, it was worth it compared to what you'd pay for in the actual stores!  A fun morning, nonetheless!  Thanks, Quin!