“Didn’t your momma ever teach you not to pay retail?”
My mom is your classic Asian lady. She has tons of pocketbooks and shoes. She dresses smartly when she goes out on the town. The thing I learned from her is never pay retail. We used to outlet shop in Reading, PA when I was a kid. Always at Carters and Buster Brown. These days she goes to Off 5th and Nordstrom’s Rack to get her Ferragamos.
In the same vein, I prefer to shop the sites where I already like the clothes and wait for a good deal, hence the Lands’ End Overstocks site I mentioned in the Frumperella post. I rarely buy stuff at retail price. My favorite purchase were a pair of $195 Danner boots for $45 from Stompersboots.com, though I had to get them at the retail shop in San Francisco for that price.
One thing I wish we could do more here in the US is to bargain. I don’t shop in stores where I can do that. But I will tell you that my mom is good. REALLY GOOD.
While we were in Italy in 1999, I really wanted to buy a 3/4 leather jacket. My mom was pretty skeptical, and had a sour look on her face the entire time we were in the store. She picked on this, picked on that. She said don’t buy it too slim or you’ll get fat and can’t wear it later. I don’t like the collar on that one, the buttons look cheap, what’s that price in dollars? etc, etc. It was a litany of grouses and put-downs. I almost gave up.
Seeing that my mother was the final arbiter of the sale, the salesman started dropping the price to entice her, thinking she was going to pay for it. She was still stony faced as the price came down to US$400.00. I couldn’t bear to leave Rome for a second time without something made of leather and $400 was easily $200 less than I would have paid in San Francisco (where I was living at the time), so I went ahead and bought the coat. All the while, mommy stood there pretty annoyed at me and the salesman.
Later on, we returned to the hotel and she was smiling brilliantly. I asked her what she was so happy about, and she started laughing. She proudly told me,’I got you a good deal on that jacket!’ Savvy woman she is. BTW, I wore that jacket to work yesterday since the weather was mild. 7 years later it still looks good. And mom was right, there was a while there when I was too fat to wear it. bah!
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