Charity shops

Sassers

Doingmybest2bgoodhurrah wrote: »

but then I'm in a 70's time warp.

Me too and I LOVE your sig. Fantastic!

yummymummy79

Absolutely! Current 22 weeks preggers and the only things I've bought new so far are 3 bits of maternity clothing in the New Look sale using a gift card I had hanging around. Other maternity stuff has come from Ebay, or just been wearing the more stretchy and/or baggy items of my normal wardrobe. Have been going to car boots for baby clothes, using son's old buggy and car seat, borrowing a cot, moses basket and bouncy chair, breat pump from freecycle and some other stuff have been on the list for grandparents to get. I'm on a limited income at the moment (JSA) so why would I want to spend loads on getting everything new?

Have got my son into it all too now, he got about £85 for his latest birthday, he's spent the majority of it on toys and puzzles from car boots and charity shops and has realised it goes a lot further that way. One of my proudest moments was when he put back an action man at a car boot that he was looking at when the man said it was £2! He did the same with his dad in ToysRUs apparently too, saying a little tiny toy wasn't worth £7.50. That's my boy!

mrswive

I sometimes buy a few CS clothes, notably a Jaeger wool jacket for £15, but my real weakness is for houehold bits and bobs from our local house clearance shop. We eat and drink from beautiful Wedgewood and Royal Doulton, which would be very Hyacinth Bucket if anything matched! (I hardly ever pay more than 25p for a plate and have bought a gorgeous Royal Doulton tea set, which had 1 saucer missing, so 17 pieces rather than 18, for £3.50)
This week I bought a set of kitchen sclaes, the ones with a mixing bowl on top which you can reset as you add stuff,which are very 70's retro. I opened the box and had to undo the original selotape; they had obviously never been used, just put in someone's kitchen cupboard and left there for 40 years and they cost £2.50. Bargain!
What I love is having interesting things in my home.

tiff

I agree prices in some of the charity chains are horrendous and I vote with my feet, I dont donate or buy anything from those but I have found some great shops with great prices Emmaus is my favourite but the Childrens Society and the PDSA arent too bad although at the moment they have some Emma Bridgwater polka dots on the shelf but its too expensive for the poor area the shop is situated in.

Emmaus where I live sell all their paperback books for 30p each so I always buy my books there. I volunteer in a charity shop and as Maman said above, we do have guidelines for how to price clothes depending on the brand although we dont always go by that as they have Kookai down as designer!

I would never buy a Primark item in a charity shop, they arent worth the price. I do buy new stuff for my kids in Primark but its getting to the point where I'm finding such good stuff in the CS that I need to shop in Primark less.

little_miss_sunshine_3

After reading your posts I decided to have a walk up to my local shops where there are 5 CS! I needed some new clothes for work, after reading starsandmoon's post I thought I would go and have a look.

I am £25 lighter but I now have:

x2 dresses
x2 tops
x1 pair of skinny jeans
and a small crochet blanket for the cat

Feeling very MSE :money:

Thanks!

tiff

lola34 wrote: »

I love CS!!!!! though I know a lot of people are quite snobby about them but like others have said they are quite green eyed at my bargains,

I just think its crazy to spend more than what you need to, some things have to be bought new and in the sales things like t shirts can be had for a few £'s so no need to buy a washed out t shirt from a CS but who's the fool when someone would rather pay £30 for an item new versus someone who got the same item for £2 in a CS?

tiff

little_miss_sunshine wrote: »

After reading your posts I decided to have a walk up to my local shops where there are 5 CS! I needed some new clothes for work, after reading starsandmoon's post I thought I would go and have a look.

I am £25 lighter but I now have:

x2 dresses
x2 tops
x1 pair of skinny jeans
and a small crochet blanket for the cat

Feeling very MSE :money:

Thanks!

Well done you, if you make a habit of looking every time you go to the high street you will soon build up a wardrobe of stuff.

domestic_goddess

If anyone reads blogs, there's a brilliant weekly link up called Magpie Monday that is over at one of my favourite blogs which is all about what bargains people have bought from charity shops and car boot sales. Quite a few blogs link up their Magpie Monday posts and I love having a mooch round them all seeing what they've bought, might be worth a look if you're a fellow bargain hunter.

*It's not my blog btw, just thought you might like the link up*

23rdspiral

i love looking around charity shops, and my local tip shops too.

looking around my living/dining room.... i've a 1970s sette (pulls out to a single bed!) (free from a friend clearing their mother's house), a very lovely 25yr old red leather sofa and chair (from OHs mum when she got new ones, prior to that we had a 15yr old donated sofa that was literally falling apart), a little side table from the tip shop, a little wine rack with tile top from freecycle, a 1950s bucket seat from freecycle(could Not believe it!), and a singer sewing machine table being used to sit plants on (tipshop). the only new bought thing is a horrid TV table from IKEA for 7.00 as we had nothing else to put the tv on (which was second hand from a friend who has to have everything top spec, and replaced one that was 15yrs old when OH family bought it ex-rental).

GOSH! i wonder how much all that would have cost if i'd have to had buy it all new... well, new equivalents, there's nothing like the 'soul' of a well loved worn in thing.

chinagirl

Guilty as charged !!
Yes, I much prefer to buy smart, as I call it.
I have a lovely (metal-action) bed-settee bought from Ebay, originallyfor our conservatory, for the kids to crash out on, but when we picked it up, it was far better than our living room settee, so we have it in the living room now. We also have 2nd hand chunky mexican style wood coffee table, far too expensive for us to buy brand new, so good ole Ebay again.
Our 'new to us' TV is a find out of the Adverts in our local paper, a 32" LCD HD Ready Flat Screen Samsung. Again, we would not have had such a modern telly if we had to buy it new.
Our dishwasher is a £50 second-hand bargain, which we have had for 4 years. Even our desk-top computer is 'pre-loved' .

Rarely do I buy myself new clothes, I tend to window shop, for brands that I like, and then search on Ebay for the 2nd hand version at a fraction of the price.

i LOVE IT!!!:j