Kids clothes can take a sizable chunk of your budget. Luckily, it is one area you can also save on in a big way! By keeping a sharp eye and thinking ahead, you’ll save yourself a bundle with just a few simple tips.
1. Buy Out of Season
You can hit the jackpot during clearance sales! At the end of the winter clothing season, you can get winter coats for half off or more! Small children are pretty predictable with clothing sizes so snatch up all the end of the season deals for them so you can save money and have your clothing shopping done in advance. Older kids can be a bit trickier, but buying key items like short sleeve shirts, boots, coats, and winter gear can still really help with your clothing budget.
Be sure to watch the Surviving The Stores Facebook page where I share the awesome online clearance sales that I find!
2. Second Hand Clothing Stores
You might want check out the second hand stores and even Goodwill before taking a trip to the mall. You may be surprised what you’ll find! This type of shopping takes active looking and patience to sort through all of the racks, and sometimes even huge boxes, of clothes. But a little extra looking is worth saving up to 90% (or sometimes more) on clothes for your kids. If you aren’t interested in buying then clean out your kid’s closet and sell back gently used items to an online resell store like thredUP or a brick & mortar store like Once Upon A Child or Plato’s Closet.
My friend Jen is a MASTER at finding great sales at Goodwill and other thrift stores! If you need some tips, I highly recommend checking out her Frugal Fashion section!
3. Garage Sales
I’m always shocked at what people decide to sell in a garage sale! I have found some steals (as in under $1!) on dresses for my girls that would normally be $50 or more. With a little searching, you can find holiday dresses, school uniforms, boots, and play clothes at garage sales. Your area newspaper is always the first place to check, but you can also find some garage sale listings on Craigslist.
Here in Dallas there are several groups on Facebook where people can join to list individual items that they have for sale. I’ve heard from many friends who only use these groups to find things that they need (and to sell things) instead of going to traditional garage sales.
4. Hand Me Downs
Your favorite clothing may not grow with your child but you can see it again on your next one! Just remember to save anything that has elastic in an air-conditioned area or the elastic might not work when you pull it out again.
One idea that I think is just brilliant is to have a clothing swap between friends. Everyone brings their used clothing items that are in good condition and you are able to take as many items as you bring. Let us know if you have tried this out with your friends!
5. Shop Local Consignment Sales
These are a different from #2 above because they only come around a few times every year (ours here in Dallas comes once before the fall season and once before the spring/summer seasons).
You can find some incredible bargains at consignment sales, and usually the quality and prices are excellent.
My personal favorite sale is the Just Between Friends sale here in Dallas, but you can find consignment sales in your area by typing in “kids consignment sale” + “your city” into Google.
You can read more about consignment sales in our post on 6 Tips For Consignment Sale Success!
What are you favorite ways to save on kids clothing?
hand me downs!
Consignment sales!
Online deals, shopathome.com or ebates.com , retailmenot.com , coupons and stacked all of the above, plus free shipping deals!
Goodwill is my favorite but I also love garage sales and clearance racks. I often struggle to find second hand items for my son, though (especially bottoms), but I do feel The Children´s Place offers a lot of great deals plus you can save even more with their coupons and a TCP credit card (as long as you pay it off right away). I usually buy their sale items and save an additional 25 – 30% with my coupon and card.