How to get an £80 Debut dress from Debenhams for £12

woodwormer

I'm sure a few of us are thinking about christmas parties by now. I know I am. So I thought I'd share this tip. I buy all my dresses from Debut at Debenhams but have never paid more than £20 for them - why? Well the company has no facility for repairing zips and in our local store there are always a few - hidden away at the back somewhere - with broken zips which are discounted by 20%, 50% and then finally 80%.

I buy them and then buy a replacement zip on ebay and unpick and resew it. It takes a couple of hours - less if you have a sewing machine or are good at that sort of thing (I'm not). OR you can take them into the dry cleaners and get a new zip put in for about £15. If you think that the average cost of the dress will be £85, and you got it for a tenner, it's well worth taking the extra ten steps to your dry cleaners to get it sorted.

I just got a gorgeous wine coloured organza ballgown - reduced from £80 which I bought on a 20% off day as well and it was £10.50. I just spent £1.50 getting a zip on ebay so the total spend for the gown will be £12.


It's also worth asking the staff what they have that is damaged - they reduce anything with marks on by 10% at least - most of the marks, lipstick, pen etc. are removable with vanish so it's worth taking a punt. I've never found a stain on an item in the store which I can't get rid of in one wash!