Category — Regular Retail Stores

March 2, 2012: Most people think of stores that sell new clothing as being cleaner than the thrifts. In this video, I read what I think is a hilarious quote about cleanliness at regular retail stores. The quote was originally posted as a comment on a terrific blog by Sally McGraw that’s called Already Pretty. You can read the quote in it’s entirety here.

The notion of shopping and wearing clothing that some stranger wore and sweated in is just too much for some people. Watch this video for a new perspective on perspiration and used clothing.

The other night, after months of really bitter cold, my husband and I broke down and went to the enormous mall (we’re talking 1,700,000 square feet of retail space). Neither one of us likes going to malls because the point of them is to part people from their money. But on this particular night, we really needed to get out of the house. Because of the extreme cold, there weren’t a lot of choices.

It had been so long since we’d visited this place that I’d forgotten about the volume and variety of stuff being sold. Stuff for your home, stuff to wear, stuff to cook with, and especially stuff for bored teenagers who spend a lot of time wandering around the mall learning to become consuming adults.

On my regular thrift store jaunts, I’m constantly scratching my head, wondering why so much barely used or brand new clothing winds up there. The rare trip to my local mall reminds me that other folks have very different spending habits than I do. Will the recent downturn in the economy start to change that? It certainly has for some people, but that’s another topic for another day.

Meanwhile, I have to admit that I succumbed to the temptations of the mall on that cold night. I bought one book from the dollar store.

Earlier this summer I did something that I just hate—went shopping at regular retail stores for a new bathing suit. After trying on stacks and stacks of swimsuits at three different places, I found one that wasn’t terrible. It was all very discouraging.  

How interesting, I thought, that I never leave a thrift store feeling discouraged, even if I try on what seems like half of what’s in the store and find nothing worth buying. 

Maybe shopping for secondhand clothing is so much more fun than shopping regular retail because of my expectations. When everything is brand new, I somehow feel that at least some of it should look terrific on me. Secondhand stores, however, are filled with stuff that’s been rejected by somebody else for one reason or another. I expect used clothing stores will have loads and loads of stuff that I don’t want. Not finding anything great doesn’t surprise me, but when I do find something great, it’s an absolute thrill.

Anyway, to get back to swimsuit situation, the friend who was with me on this shopping ordeal (she also had to try on about a thousand to find just one that was reasonably attractive) suggested that if somebody could just come up with a bathing suit that covers every single inch of our bodies, that person would become wealthy indeed. 

The ads I’ve seen for the women’s clothing chain called White House/Black Market have confused me, so when I was recently in New York City and walked by one of their stores, I decided to pause and have a look. Amazing! The idea is that since all of the clothing is either black, white or a mix of the two, it all goes together. That makes buying and coordinating a wardrobe simple. Really, really clever marketing, I think, because putting together a women’s wardrobe is so complicated. Many people just hate doing it.  

I guess it would be possible to put together a secondhand wardrobe out of just two colors—has anybody out there done this, and if so, how did it work for you?