{"id":327,"date":"2012-01-11T13:15:18","date_gmt":"2012-01-11T12:15:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.colindgordon.net\/?p=327"},"modified":"2012-08-25T14:45:30","modified_gmt":"2012-08-25T13:45:30","slug":"the-january-sales-a-waste-of-time-money","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/2012\/01\/the-january-sales-a-waste-of-time-money\/","title":{"rendered":"The January Sales: A Waste Of Time & Money?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The American author & poet,William Burroughs, once described \u201cjunk\u201d as \u201cThe ideal product, the ultimate merchandise. No sales talk is necessary\u2026The client will crawl through a sewer and beg to buy\u201d. Although it would be somewhat harsh to apply the last part to the thousands of people who packed into Britain\u2019s high street both before and after Christmas looking for cut-price items, many media commentators appear to agree with the overall gist of Burrough\u2019s comment. The \u201cSunday Times\u201d columnist India Knight , for example, was clearly mystified (in her article on 1st<\/sup> January) by the two thousand \u201ccrazy bargain hunters\u201d who had camped all night outside Selfridges and then, on Boxing Day morning (27th<\/sup> December) \u201cstampeded into the store like buffaloes, looking uncannily like barbarians about to pillage\u201d. Who are these people, she asked and \u201cwhat is wrong with them?\u201d She couldn\u2019t see the point in being\u00a0 \u201ccrushed by the crowds, surrounded by shoving lunatics , all for the joy of scavenging for leftovers\u201d. Her view that sales shopping is \u201cself-delusion on an epic scale\u201d, that it\u2019s not cheap if you don\u2019t need it, has been echoed by many other journalists.<\/p>\n

The BBC\u2019s \u201cWatchdog\u201d Consumer Advice website points out that it\u2019s easy to get sucked into January spending that is basically unnecessary: \u201cIf you spy some \u2018half price\u2019 designer shoes (apparently reduced from \u00a3300 to \u00a3175) and impulse buy, it\u2019s only a good deal if you really want them! If not, you\u2019ve just \u2018lost\u2019 \u00a3175\u201d. Felicity Hannah of \u201cYahoo! Finance\u201d concedes\u00a0 that her perceptions tend to be warped by 80% discounts and that she\u2019s got tops she\u2019s never worn but bought \u201cbecause they were such good value\u201d. She just sees the potential saving instead of assessing what the purchase is actually worth: \u201cYou have to make a real effort to look at whether you can afford the price\u201d. Many of the shoppers themselves seem to have been simply caught up by the mood of the moment.\u00a0 A female Polish chef interviewed by \u201cThe Guardian\u201d at the Westfield shopping centre in Stratford, east London, assumed that there must be good bargains available, \u201cotherwise why would everyone be queueing?\u201d. According to an IT worker from west London, there was sheer \u201cmadness\u201d inside the centre. She hadn\u2019t prepared a list of what she hoped to buy, so got into a \u201cfreestyle shopping frenzy\u201d.<\/p>\n

For anyone who is nonetheless determined to venture into the melee, \u201cWhich.co.uk\u201d emphasises that shops advertising a sale are required to abide by legislation enacted in May 2008: Before prices are reduced, the product must have been sold at a higher price for 28 consecutive days in that branch of the store. The original price must be clearly displayed along with the sale price: \u201cA sign cannot just say \u2018Sale: \u00a320\u2019 \u2013 it must add something like \u2018Was \u00a340, sale price \u00a320\u2019 \u201d. The problem with this, of course (as noted on \u201cabout.com\/bargainshoppingtips) is that \u201cthe practice of marking up an original price, making it look as though it\u2019s been drastically reduced, has become common practice in many stores\u201d. Only the regular clientele to a shop can be absolutely sure whether the tags on the clothes are accurate. In the Hawes & Curtis chain, for instance, York shirts currently being offered for \u00a328 normally cost \u00a389. Even when there\u2019s no duplicity involved, the average customer with limited means will probably not linger for long in up-market shops displaying fashionable torn jeans reduced from \u00a3195 to \u201cmerely\u201d \u00a3165. It\u2019s also noticeable that in many of the stores with \u201cUp To 70% Off\u201d stickers on their front windows (once inside, that often changes to 50% or less for what Burroughs would consider to be \u201cjunk\u201d, or in current parlance, \u201ctat\u201d) the best items are invariably in the \u201cNon-Sale\u201d sections.<\/p>\n

A recent \u201cWhich\u201d report on the main supermarkets concluded that \u201c some stores inflate prices for a few days, before promoting their products as being half-price or better for weeks afterwards\u201d. This could apply similarly to some other parts of the retail sector. On the \u201cTotally You Consulting\u201d website, writer Sandra Collins recommends observing the following criteria when considering a purchase: \u201cThe garment must fit you; It must combine with at least three other items of clothing in your wardrobe; You will be able to wear it for at least three seasons, with adaptations; The colour should look great on you\u201d. Meanwhile, both \u201cWhich\u201d and the BBC\u2019s \u201cWatchdog\u201d provide information about how to obtain a refund on (or exchange) something you have bought yourself or have received as a Christmas present. A fifth of respondents questioned by \u201cWhich\u201d have stated that they are \u201cfrustrated by shops not making it clear that their returns policy is different while the sales are on\u201d. They moreover feel that the returns policy should be displayed at the point of purchase and have complained about shop staff\u2019s \u201clack of knowledge\u201d regarding the return of faulty goods \u2013 a right, \u201cWhich\u201d executive director Richard Lloyd has declared, that is equally valid for items bought in the sales. A list of \u201ctypical return times\u201d is available on the BBC\u2019s \u201cWatchdog\u201d website: Included are: Marks & Spencer (35 days), John Lewis (28 days), B&Q (45 days), Argos (30 days), Debenhams (usually 28 days \u2013 but extended to 31st<\/sup> January), Boots (Unlimited returns policy with a receipt). By law, faulty goods should be returned within a \u201creasonable time\u201d, which in practice means having had sufficient opportunity \u201cto take the product home, try it out and bring it back. It\u2019s important to claim promptly\u201d. The \u201cSale Of Goods Act 1979\u201d stipulates that a product must be \u201cAs described (by the seller), of satisfactory quality and \u2018fit for purpose\u2019\u201d. Even if you\u2019ve lost the receipt, says \u201cWatchdog\u201d, a bank statement, credit card bill or cheque- book stub can constitute adequate proof of purchase.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the UK media consensus is that, despite (or even because of) the \u201cheavy discounting\u201d, many well-known high street businesses \u2013 such as La Senza (lingerie), Dixons, Clinton Cards, HMV, Past Times (nostalgia gifts), Barratts Priceless (shoes), Hot Tuna (surfwear) \u2013 appear to be in severe financial straits. Their income in some cases is insufficient to cover either fixed overheads or debt repayments. Provisional figures released by \u201cExperian Footfall\u201d and quoted in the \u201cDaily Telegraph\u201d on 2nd<\/sup> January imply that the Boxing Day rush was \u201c a short-lived blip\u201d. One phenomenon, though, slightly alleviating the pervading gloom is that \u201cThe Chinese are in town and spending as never before – 63% up over the past year (Robert Hardman in the \u201cDaily Mail\u201d on 2nd<\/sup> January). Investment group \u2018CLSA Asia-Pacific\u2019 analysts calculate that \u201cby 2020 the Chinese will consume 44% of all the world\u2019s luxury goods\u201d. Where did their economic boom (at least in part) come from? Exporting cheap clothes to Europe, the USA \u2013 and to us here in the UK!<\/p>\n

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The American author & poet,William Burroughs, once described \u201cjunk\u201d as \u201cThe ideal product, the ultimate merchandise. No sales talk is necessary\u2026The client will crawl through a sewer and beg to buy\u201d. Although it would be somewhat harsh to apply the last part to the thousands of people who packed into Britain\u2019s high street both before […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-327","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-society"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=327"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":428,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327\/revisions\/428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}