January Sales Madness! (Next)

Member Name: mreyre

Product:	Next
Date:	06/01/02 (894 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: sales are great!, the clothes for kiddies last really well, they wash really well, too

Disadvantages: some shops are very cramped, have to wake up early to get the real bargains

I thought that dooyoo readers would be interested in hearing my experiences of the “Next” January Sales, and in doing so, might pick up a few helpful tips for beating the rush next year.

As regular dooyooers will know, I now live in Norfolk with my wife and three-year old girl. However, Jo, my better half, used to live in the Midlands, and we regularly visit relatives there. We usually travel back there at Christmas, and this year was no exception. In the past, we have always been to the January sales in Sutton Coldfield on the 27th December and always come back with bags of clothes from “Next”. The main disadvantage being with that particular store is that the aisles are very thin and you cannot get to all the clothes without being pushed over in the rush. Also, they usually have minders on the front entrance, limiting the amount of people who can go in, so if you don’t get there extra early, then you’ve had it.

This year, we decided to be different, as recently, a new retail complex has just grown up just on the outskirts of Tamworth. There are many retail stores there, including a “Big W” (unheard of in Norfolk), Boots, Asda, Mothercare World, you know the type of thing. Luckily for us, there’s also a huge “Next”. On the morning of the 27th Deecmber, we decided to get up as early as we possibly could, left Lucy with her Nan……

(TIP NUMBER ONE: Sales are no place for little children!!)

…….and zoomed off to Tamworth. We got to the retail complex at about 6.45 a.m. Initially, there were no signs of cars, so we thought our luck was in, but as we turned into the complex, cars a-plenty!! The car park was completely packed and “Next” was heaving!

I then dropped Jo off at the entrance (TIP NUMBER TWO!) and zipped off to find a car parking space within the nearest mile of the store! Then, I barged through the crowds, picking up
a selection of large carrier bags (TIP NUMBER THREE!) and made my way to the children’s clothes. We had a brief look round the store together and I joined the end of the queue at about 7.15 a.m. (VERY VALUABLE TIP NUMBER FOUR!). This then enabled Jo to whizz round the shop, picking things up and throwing them (literally) to me whilst standing in the queue. We were then able to check if we really needed the clothes and whether we were making a huge saving or not.

Now you will realise why Tip Number Four was so valuable, as I was eventually served at 8.45 a.m. (yes, I had been in the queue for an hour-and a half!). We actually spent a grand total of £174 on clothes, mainly for Lucy, some for us too. We bought mainly 4-5 year old stuff as she is 3 now, the main bargain being a really thick winter coat for £12.99, reduced from £25.

This might seem like a lot of money, but we have no real need to buy many more clothes throughout the year now. Also, out of interest, I added up all the tags with the orginal prices on them, and it came to about £400. Therefore we saved at least £200 on the original prices. Worth queuing all that time for – also, we were back in the house by 9 a.m. and went all the way to a designer retail outlet in Mansfield later in the day for more sales shopping, but I’ll save that for another review!

In summary, we found that this Next outlet was far better than the ones in towns, for example the Sutton Coldfield branch. Although the store was packed, there was plenty of room to look at the bargains and the atmosphere was very friendly. The staff were giving out mints to keep the customers calm (I suggested Bacon Butties for next year) and the staff were very helpful. If you think we spent a lot, the guy in front of us spent £540!

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