Back to school clothing sales: How to find fall fashion for less

Summer is ending and the shorts, flip flops, and tanks will become leisure wear for the weekends. August begins the month of school expenses: shopping for school supplies; purchasing new shoes; buying new clothes; writing the checks for school lunches and field trips. One way to save money and ease the rapid decrease in cash flow from the bank account is to save money on school clothes.

In order to save money on the fall fashions, the following tips are recommended:

1. Look in your local paper, especially the Sunday ads, for the sales. The big department stores, as well as the smaller clothing shops, advertise sales throughout the month of August. Also, within the Sunday paper, the sale ads usually contain discount coupons, which will save you even more money.

2. Log on to the Internet and search for your favorite clothing stores. Sign-up for emails from the department stores: you will receive emails about upcoming sales; the stores will email you discount coupons; and usually because you are an email subscriber, the stores will offer bigger discount incentives. Also, at times, Internet shopping sites will offer cheaper prices online, free shipping and handling, and discount coupons. Before purchasing online, always do a search for current coupon codes because you are more than likely to find and added discount for the online shopping stores, which will save you a lot of money on name brand clothing.

3. Recycle some clothing from older brothers, sisters, cousins, friends, whoever has children who wear similar sizes. Growing up, my cousin who is a little older than I, always had the latest fashions and never wore her clothes out; so, I gained all of her hand-me-downs, which made my mom happy because she saved a great deal of money.

4. If you live near a factory outlet, take the time to go in each store; peruse the sale racks and find the bargains. Factory outlets have quality, name-brand clothing at discount prices. Stop by the Service Office and pick up a discount booklet. Almost all factory outlets have coupon booklets that offer store discounts on the already low-priced fall fashions.

5. The best tip that I have found for my children, wait until after school begins because the stores have many of the clothes marked down and/or placed on the clearance racks by the end of September, beginning of October. Name brand clothing that can be found at major department stores, have great sales after school begins. You will get a real sale if you wait.

These five tips are the ones that I have used while shopping with my four children ensuring that they all strut the latest fashions even on a budget. We save a great deal of money, and my children love to continue shopping even after school begins. Happy bargain hunting!

Learn more about this author, Lili Melton Ph.D..
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