***ONE FOOT IN THE BARGAIN BUCKET**** (Priceless Shoes)

Name: malibu_jenny

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Product:	Priceless Shoes
Date:	21/10/07 (776 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Well Lit And Located Stores, Bargains, Reasonable Quality.

Disadvantages: Nothing to sit on, no boxes for your purchase, smells like... teen spirit?

It was after work this week, with a nip in the air and sport on the telly. I was wandering through the dusky town centre after work, with that feeling you get when everyone else is rushing for the bus and you have no place to be in a hurry. My beloved Pixie Boots hadn’t survived the day, with a split down the middle they were nearer the bin than Timpsons. I felt it was time for a new pair of boots and I needed them to be the following; cheap (I prefer to buy expensive shoes for going out), hardwearing (funny how a few trips to the photocopier and the station ruin them so quickly) and fashionable (because they had to match my new smock dress).

Reading has a plethora of shoe shops; Faith, Clarks, Dolcis, Cara and so many more. But for some unknown reason, PriceLess Shoes caught my eye. I went in, more to count it out of the search than anything. The sale posters in the window screamed ‘Shoes for £5’ and well, who wouldn’t want a pair of shoes for that. The outside of the shop was white with black and red lettering, unappealingly plain. There were a few plastic-coated wire racks outside stuffed with fake Ugg boots which looked like dodgy slippers and a pile of crates inside the door.

What possible euphemism can I use here? Sub-prime? Value? Economic? Cheap and cheerful in all honesty, PriceLess Shoes is not one for the particularly discerning shopper. It’s the kind of place that your mother would have told you never to buy shoes, unless of course she was a twelve year old chav. An incredible range of the tacky and tarty, patent pink knee high to furry ankle boots with pom-poms. And of course the ridiculous Ugg boots. Yep, ten minutes in here and you could easily leave dressed like Lady Sovereign or Mutya Buena on a bad day.

There were a few customers milling about and I pushed my way through the racks to the back of the shop. It’s not the biggest shop, yet the selection was crowded in such a way as to make the task seem quite daunting. There was a row of flat sensible looking shoes. No ballet pumps or anything, just flat, dull shoes. Slippers, with and without fur. Luckily there were also seven different variations on this season’s leather pump.

Pair number one were the kind of thing you wear with a Croydon face lift and a bomber jacket. They sat just the wrong side of sexy, with deep wrinkles like a former Big Brother contestant who loves the Fantasy tanning salon. However, the second pair I tried had the capacity to say Goth chic meets Belle Du Jour if you removed them from their lowly setting, matched them with a pair of knee high socks and a mini skirt… hang about, these were for work. They were like the latest Mary-Janes, but a boot version, as though the wearer had a pair of matching leather socks. The 4 inch heel appeared to be reasonably glued on and I balanced precariously on one leg to remove my existing boots.

At this point there was a thud on the wall of glass which separates the shop from the street. The Boyfriend had appeared outside, together with the bandana-clad Mr D who was puffing on a Marlboro Reds and shouting “Yeah, get them, they’re well sexy”. The lady who’d been at the shelf next to me decided to join in, telling me that they’d look very nice on me. Confronted on all sides and jammed between the shelves, I looked around to find somewhere to sit and try them on.

Seeing me looking, the assistant apologised for the lack of chairs. “We don’t have anything to sit on at all” she said. “Our manager decided it would be a good idea to take all the chairs away”. I didn’t really want to sit on the floor in my expensive wool trousers, so I swept a pile of shoes from a jutting shelf and perched against that.

The boots are intended to be set out in pairs, which I personally think is a winning formula. There’s not much more annoying than having to queue for an assistant, wait for them to bring the shoes from a distant stockroom, discover the pair don’t fit….. Seen the Brantano advert? However, they get a bit shuffled around as you might expect. They don’t appear to be arranged by size and they’re not annoyingly tagged together to prevent you walking around to test them. It’s kind of a free for all jumble, with the possibility of leaving with odd shoes if you’re not careful. I squished four fingers against the glass to indicate the size I wanted to the boys and checked the sticky labels on the nearest pair.

Mr D rapped the glass to draw my attention to a green pair, identical to the black ones in my hand. I say green, but – and this is will sound strange to blokes out there – not the right shade. Had they been this winter’s pretty teal colour to match my footless tights, I’d have snapped them up. But they were closer to the shade of Happy Shopper Mushy Peas. I shook my head and pulled a face. The black pair were great though, looked like real leather and with a solid enough heel to be practical.

The boys had moved round to the front of the shop and run half an eye over the men’s shoes. Seeing the dull selection of brandless trainers and pull-on winklepickers, they dismissed it and came over. “That was easy!” said The Boyfriend chirpily. There was no queue at the counter, but we had a short wait. The thing about buying shoes in here is that they don’t maintain a consistent counter presence, or give you a box for the shoes. However, they’re normally quite quick to serve and they provide sturdy carrier bags.

The shoes in store range from £5 (or in the cases of some sale items £3) through to £20. Mine were £20, which isn’t amazing value considering you can buy shoes at this price in almost any high street store, most of which are a lot more upmarket. However, I was happy to wear them round to check out Mr D’s new flat that evening, I’ve worn them to work for a week without them falling apart and I debated wearing them out to dinner last Friday. I’m pleased with such a versatile choice and I’ve had a few compliments on the new boots, but not on the smell. Shoes from PriceLess seem to have this overriding smell like burning rubber.

So to sum up, this is a quick and easy shoe-fix; I wouldn’t make it my only stop, but I wouldn’t completely discount it. It’s been a short-term fix, but I’ll still be checking out the shoe displays elsewhere in my quest for the perfect pair.

Selection: Hit and miss, but most of the women’s shoes are reasonably fashionable. 7/10
Price: The more expensive shoes aren’t great value, but there’s plenty on offer for the lower budget. 8/10
Service: A little stroppy and slapdash at the counter and no help on the shop floor, but no long wait required either.. 5/10.
Store Layout: Cramped, with no chairs to sit on, but lit up like a laminate floored Blackpool. 6/10
Quality of product: Surprisingly good. Only the smell loses points. 8/10

Total score: 34/50

It's worth noting that they don't have a website, the quickest way to find your local store is < http://www.touchlocal.com/business/search/name/Pri celess%20Shoes >

Summary: PriceLess is better than Shoe Less in an emergency.