Do you shop during the sale season ?

Also Read :
Shopping Tips for Sale Season

Another blog sale is coming up next week.:)

Day Tuesday- 25th May

Time 4 p.m Indian Standard Time

If anyone of you is interested in putting up your products for sale, please contact me at

Here are some of the things I would need from the sellers.

• Atleast 1-2 real pictures of the products in their present condition.
• Swatches and a little description of the products.
• How much have you used the product.
• Whether you want to sell your products within India only or you would be able to ship internationally as well.
• Original price of the products.
• Sale price of the products.
• Shipping charges, if any.
• Expiry date of the products.
• Mode of payment.

I would need all the information by Monday- May 23, 2010 .

Please note that I would not be responsible for anything regarding the sale put up by others. I am just providing a common platform. I would connect the buyers to the sellers and they would be solely responsible for their transactions and dealings.

Do let me know if you have any questions and queries.

Me, excited.

I confess I am a big shopaholic. Based on my experience here are a few tips to avoid expensive shopping mistakes and economic ways to keep your wardrobe up to date.

1) Replicate !

When you buy a branded outfit, your price includes logistics, cost of setting up a store etc etc. No can deny getting an outfit stitched works out be to cheaper than buying at a store at least 90% of the time. But many women are very apprehensive about getting clothes stitched. Some feel the finish will never be the same. Not true!

The first step in replicating is to find a good tailor. Again there is a misconception that only the expensive tailors are good. I confess I had this misconception till I found my HG tailor .Finding a good and reasonable tailor can be a long process but once you have, believe me its totally worth it! The next step is to find a place to source materials from. The best place for this is whole sale dealers and street side material vendors. I normally shop at Cotton street and Nalli at Chennai and Chikpet at Bangalore. With a little patience you can find really nice prints at good prices.

So next the time you fall in love with that really fantastic and really expensive outfit take a good look at it. Are you really really sure you cant replicate it? With a good tailor and reasonable material store, you definitely can! And also make considerable savings in the process. What I personally like about replicating stuff is that I can get it done to fit me perfectly and I add sometimes add a little detail of my own. Like same fancy buttons or a little embroidery.

2) Stitch your own

This was a tactic I learned from a friend but am yet to start on. If you can take a quick crash course on stitching and start experimenting, there is nothing like it. Once you have gotten the hang of stitching an outfit, you can browse stores for patterns and create them on your own. Not only will you save money you can also have a lot of fun in the process.

3) Borrow from like sized

I had this “wedding season dilemma”. Suddenly there are a string of weddings and you cannot repeat any of your outfits as you are bound to meet the same people. And buying a new outfit for every wedding is not a feasible option. I managed to solve this issue with a “give and take policy” with two of my close friends. We are more or less the same size, so we swap outfits. Now people in my family think I have a super extensive wardrobe ;)

4) Accessories

Sometimes I have to repeat an outfit to office within a time span of say three weeks. To avoid being tagged “boring” by my colleagues I play around with accessories. Accessories can totally make or break an outfit. Mixing and matching different accessories can totally change the look of an outfit.

For example a black kurta can be teamed with a bandhini duppata and salwar. If you have to repeat the outfit, you can team with a nice stole, jeans and funky bangles.

Explore street side shops for accessories. With a little patience and bargaining you can get good deals. These street side shops are also good places to pick up buttons, borders etc that you can add to clothes for a nice touch.

5) Basic neutral colors

Buying tops/kurtas/pants in neutral colors is a good way to build your wardrobe. But before picking it up see if you can match it with at least 2/3 things in your current wardrobe.

6) Keep your old salwars/churidars

I pick up a lot of my Indian outfits from places like FabIndia and Westside where you can mix and match. While I give away my kurtas once I have stopped fitting into or if it begins to fade, I hang on to my duppatas and churidars/salwars. These can always come in handy in the future. It can always be matched with kurtas you pick up later and works out as a saving.

7) Wait for sales

When I fall in love with an outfit, I first check out if the store is going to have a sale soon. If it does, it makes sense to wait for a while and pick it up during the sale season.

8) Be careful at sales.

While sales are big savers, they can also end up burning a hole in your pocket. Offers such as “buy two t shirts of the similar type and get a third free” can actually cause you more damage. When going in for such an offer ask yourself if you really need three t-shirts of the same type. While such offers might seem exciting, if you really think about most often they just encourage you to buy something you don’t really need.

Another area to stay clear in sales is where they offer you stuff dirt cheap but say “No trial”. It may seem worthy to take the risk of the outfit not fitting, since you are not paying much. Take it from a seasoned shopoholic, this is not true. You might think by avoiding such mistakes you hardly make any savings. But doing this a few times can give you considerable savings that you can instead use to buy something you really like and can try.

9) Care for your clothing.

The care tags are put on our clothes for a reason. Take some time out and read them! A little extra time taken to take care of your clothes can go a long way. Adding rock salt when washing clothes that are vegetable dyed will reduce fading. While starching cotton and linen clothes helps maintain its “just out of the store” look.

I hope my little tips prove useful!

Image Source 1, 2, 3

Okay,  long awaited The Body Shop India Sale is on. I picked up some stuff from there today. The sale says upto 50 percent off but most products are 15 percent off and a very few of them are ar25, 35 and 50 percent off. People are just buying buckets full of stuff. It’s time you too rush as well!

Members have an advantage of extra 10 percent off. So it means if you are a member you could avail the benefit of 25% on a 15% off stuff. The membership fees is Rs 500 and you would get a 10% discount through out the year.

I would review the products that I bought in coming week so that it might be helpful to some of your guys.

Some updates:

I went to Shopper’s Stop to check out Lakme’s Satin Finish Lipsticks. First the SA didn’t even know that something new was launched by Lakme. The stock was displayed right in front so I only told him that these are the new launches. Second, I wanted to check those out but they didn’t have the testers. The guy gave me an offer to pick the lipsticks only by their number. Third, I asked him for a 527 shade. They had all lipsticks in only 423 shade. Sigh!! He didn’t even know the price. I was so annoyed.

The same Shopper’s Stop has an offer going on Maybelline lipsticks and nail paints. Buy two get one free. I selected two shades and then asked if I could choose the third one. They said that there is only one fixed shade. I asked them for the free shade but they had no clue about it. Reason, the Maybelline SA had gone out for a lunch and no one else but him could give an info about the free shade. Finally, didn’t buy anything.

I had no more enthusiasm to look for stuff at other counters so I headed straight to the Colorbar’s store.

Boy! they never fail to impress me. I think they have included someone new in their staff and the girl was so smiles and warmth. To give you some updates about makeup:

• Colorbar has launched some 8-10 shades of blushes and in some gorgeous colours from browns to peaches to plums to gold and silver shimmers. I picked up another one.
• They have come up with coloured kajals. Right now in two colours-purple and black. the packaging is one to fall in love with. It’s shiny black packaging with a little red ribbon hanging at the bottom. How cute is that.
• They have come up with duo lipsticks. These lipsticks are only for their stores and would not be sold online. They are created on the concept of changing your look from day to night.  They are two lipstick shades joined with each other from between. One shade is lighter for the day time and the other one is darker for the night time.  The third shade you can create by mixing the two. Price is in the range of Rs 375 or 400. Forgot!
• And new nail paint colours as usual.

Here is the blush I bought:

Colorbar Blush Cinnabar

Colorbar Blush Cinnabar Swatch

It’s a peachy blush witth sliver shimmer and it’s called Cinnabar.

The SA was very sweet and made my shopping a happy experience. I so love colorbar, they are really doing some thoughtful and quality work.

Inglot has the same 40 percent off going on their nail paints. Inglot has the face primers (Rs 900)and eyeshadow primers (Rs 490). The eye primers look like the MAC paint pots and the face primer is a transparent silicon gel that comes in an tiny tube.

Just in case you guys try any of their primers. Do let me know. I am yet to try primers.

By the way, have you guys tried Maggi’s Pazzta. I love it. It’s such a lazy people meal.