My Sale Guide

Designer Picks

Clockwise from left: Tweed jacket - Erdem £980 NOW £490 ; Digital print dress - Mary Katrantzou £930 NOW £650; Leather tote - Chloe £665 NOW £399; Glitter heels - Miu Miu £420 NOW £210
High Street Picks

Clockwise from left: Blazer - Reiss £225 NOW £67; Embellished dress - French Connection £285 NOW £142; Shoulder bag - Hobbs £285 NOW £159; Glitter heels - Topshop £55 NOW £30
I have already delved into the sales myself, snatching up a couple of pairs of heels from Topshop (one of which is the pair pictured). I'm not going mad this year though, I've found a couple of rules keep me from spending just because I certain things are now in my budget.
My 5 Sale Rules
1. Did you want it before it went on sale? - this one is self-explanatory. For example, one of the pairs of shoes I bought in the Topshop sale I'd had my eye on for a few months, as they went down by 50% I snatched them up for £25, but I wouldn't have paid £50 for them as they are for occassional wear only. The one but with this rule is when it doesn't work - although I wasn't in a position to buy it, the Mulberry Effie satchel that I'd been coveting was reduced in the sale and is now sold out *sniff*, it only went down by £79 to £316 so it was still out of my budget which makes it easier to deal with but still frustrating.
2. Will you wear it? - surely a simple and straight-forward question which all shoppers should ask themselves, right? There's something about the mania of a sale which makes people (myself included) blindly buy an item because it's cheap, or even because there are a few people fighting over it so it must be good. Will you wear it? Can you think of an occassion? Does it go with other items in your wardrobe?
3. Will it last? - does it have longevity? Will it see you through till next season? I'm not really a stickler for trends and what's in/out, but if you're coming into spring and there are a load of long sleeved dresses in the end of season sale, are you going to get wear out of it? 4. Do you already have it? - I don't mean this exact item as hopefully your wardrobe isn't that extensive, but do you already have something similar that you don't wear very often? On the flipside, do you have something similar which you have worn to death and therefore need to replace? In that case, bingo!
5. Does it fit? - the most basic is rules when buying clothes/shoes at any time but I there are still some items that slip through the net. Don't buy it unless it fits (or if it just needs a small tweak and you have a good dry cleaner/mum/friend who can do the alterations). I mainly fall down on this one when trying on shoes and I don't walk around enough in them in the shop, walk up and down as normally as you can. Check they aren't pinching around the toes or your heels aren't coming out when you walk. If you don't have time to try clothes on in the fitting room before your purchase then check the returns policy. If you're spending £50 on that dress but you can only return it for gift vouchers then spend the extra 10 minutes queuing for that changing room.
Do you have any sale rules that you follow? Have you bought anything in the sales yet?