credit crunch tasty! (Primark)

Member Name: forestgateaux

Product:	Primark
Date:	04/11/08 (230 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: you can get a whole christmas wardrobe for the price of 1 dress elsewhere

Disadvantages: not the best quality

Primark is deffinatly the store i shop most in.

On a trip to town I will usually spend ages in topshop and the other expensive high street shops, agonising over whether i can afford something. Then I head across the road to Primark and am delighted by all the low price goodies I can fill my basket with!

Although I buy around 75% of my casual clothing there I don't usually buy 'going out dresses'. Simply because every other person in Glasgow on a Friday night will be wearing the same thing! Those things I do buy I like to customise or wear with extravagant accessories to try and look a bit different.

It used to be that Primark made great 'copies' of the fashion clothing from other high street shops. But nowadays the designs are often more to my taste than the more expensive clothing available! This season in particular they have some gorgeous designs and I'm not surprised people make such a fuss over them.

Sadly the quality is often questionable. You often have to hunt through a selection of the same item in the same size to find one that doesn't have buttons missing/ runs in the fabric/ an irregular hem line and so on. In the past i have tried on 4 or 5 of the same dress in the same size to find one which fitted best, as the tayloring is not very consistant.

I did recently have a disaster in one of their prom dresses - i was at a gig, wearing it for the 1st time, when the zip broke, leaving me practically naked in the venue! So I thoroughly recommend checking zips, seams and hems before buying.

There is also the curse of the orange fake tan/ foundation smeered on a large quantity of their stock! Though a tip for those frustrated shoppers - i recently got 70% knocked off something because of this, and it came off in the wash first time with some 'vanish'!

I think Primark is brilliant for things like knitwear, t shirts, underwear, pyjamas and handbags. They make some lovely shoes at bargain prices - often very good copies of shoes in topshop and office. But a pair of pumps or boots from there has never lasted me more than a few months wear. I think this is fine in lots of cases, as by that time they could be out of fashion anyway. If you need a pair of shoes for the party season I'd deffinatly go to Primark! The same with dresses and other sparkly party bits. Some clothes may not look as good after their first wash, but you can still get a few wears out of them before then.

I buy a large quantity of my christmas presents in there. Their pyjamas only cost £4 and they make them in christmas prints, with sowflakes or polar bears. They come tied with a ribbon so make a great gift, especially if you team them with a pair of slippers (For £1-£3) and a hot water bottle (£3)!

You only need to search for Primark on ebay to see how successful they are. A dress from Primark may sell for as much as £100. I think this is because all the fashion magazines feature Primark clothing as good bargains, or get excited when a celebrity is spotted wearing something cheap. Then because it's been in a magazine it no longer matters how much it originally cost, people want it no matter what.

Summary: buy for the season, rather than for life, then sell on ebay and buy a new wardrobe!