How To Shop Guilt Free- The Inside Tea to Saving

Denim Jacket(similar) | Neon Slip Dress (similar) | White Sneakers (Similar) 

 

I've been a cheap friend, I've been the girl with the sale tea, and I've been called " the plug".  The thing all these nicknames all have in common is they mean your girl knows how to save money and stretch a buck.  I don't believe in paying full price, and when I absolutely have to I make sure it's as cost-effective as possible.  Most of us are living on a fixed income, I know that I am, but shopping also brings me joy so I always find a way to have balance.  We have to pay the bills, obviously, but we also deserve to have the things in this life we enjoy.  

Finding the balance between buying the things I want and taking care of my responsibilities has been an ongoing struggle for me, especially as a blogger.  Sharing the latest trends and styling new outfits is literally part of my job, so I had to find a way to be able to do that and still make sure I wasn't digging myself in a hole.  A lot of you have asked how I always find a coupon code, or when you see me buy a higher ticket item you've asked how I've been able to do it because you know I typically lean towards a discount.  Where there's a will there's a way, but beyond that, there are also a few little tricks I've found along the way that have helped me be able to responsibly shop.

Buy Now Pay Later

Buy now pay later is a service that's not news to any of us.  I'm sure you have either seen or used one of these options at checkout when you're online shopping.  This has been one of my most utilized shopping tools and I'm not afraid to say it.  In fall and winter, there are a lot of bigger ticket items that are necessary for the weather and may seem like too large of an investment, but these services make them far more attainable.  If you're on the east coast you have to have a jacket, coat, and pair of boots and if you're anything like me you have to have several different variations and styles because in this weather that's literally the entire outfit.  Since we are currently in the season it's a little less often than you will find these items on sale, but with these buy now pay later services it makes things a little more affordable.  

The top three that I swear by are Afterpay, Quadpay, and Klarna.  I've written an article about Quadapay before that goes a little more in-depth, but these companies take the total of your item and splits it into 4 equal payments ( with $1 added to each payment) every two weeks over a course of 6 weeks.   So for example, if your Jacket costs $200 instead of you paying that upfront you will instead pay $51 upfront the day you are making your purchase and then $51 every two weeks, for three more times.  You have no IDEA how many things I've purchased through these companies.  They typically have a list of retailers that they work with and you will notice when you are online shopping and go to checkout they will be listed under the payment options.  You would simply select them as your form of payment and it will redirect you to their site to log in and complete your transaction.  

Although all of them are a god send I would have to pick Afterpay and Quadpay as my favorite two.  Some of the benefits that Afterpay has that Quadpay does not is that they usually run sales with their retailers and you can get special deals when shopping if you use Afterpay at checkout ( Klarna does this as well if you shop at H&M).  They even have an " Afterpay Day" when there are insane deals, at places like Forever21, Oak and Fort, MAC to name a few, and you use their specific discount code and use afterpay at checkout and BOOM money saved.  It's awesome.  I never miss an Afterpay Day, and sometimes I will even wait until Afterpay day to make purchases on items I don't believe will go out of stock.

Quadpay on the other hand does not usually run these kinds of discounts, but where they may lack in that area they make up for in the fact that you can use Quadpay anywhere.  Not only is the list of places you can checkout with Quadpay endless you can also physically use it in-store as your form of payment.  YES!! I mean at the register of your favorite store.  My favorite place to use it is when I'm in Sephora buying up all the makeup.  The total can get a bit intimidating and having the ability to just pay 25% of the cost upfront is a godsend.  Now let's circle back to the " you can use it anywhere" because I really want to make sure I'm clear here.  If you can google the store you can use Quadpay there.  Outside of clothing, I have even used Quadpay to pay for airfare, Airbnb, Vacation packages, a heating bill that was far more than I could have imagined one month, and on amazon for props for a shoot.   Quadpay definitely is the queen when it comes to accessibility.  No other service tops it in that area.  The only con for me is all the online shopping has to be initiated in their app in order to use it.  Sometimes this is annoying when I'm already on a site ready to checkout.  With the other services like Afterpay and Klarna you usually see the option of payment built in at checkout in the retailers that they work with.  

So if you have a shopping list that you would love to hit checkout on but you wish there was some kind of layaway option.  There is in fact, there's three so you don't have to wait anymore.  I almost forgot the best part.  Once you make that first payment the items are yours.  It's not like back in the day when you would put something on layaway and you couldn't have it until you paid it off.  You are literally buying it now and paying later.  Your items will ship to you in their regular timeframe as if you paid the total amount upfront.  And if you change your mind and want to make a return you will still get back whatever you paid for them.  Returns function just the same.  These services will refund you the initial payment or however many payments you made on the items.

Amazing! I know.

Shoptagr

I get so many texts and DM's asking me for coupon codes because it is a well-known fact that I usually find a coupon code for everything.  I recently found out that many of you think I have some kind of secret inside insight into these companies marketing plans ( I wish I did) but that's not it at all.  I use an app and website called Shoptagr that literally scours the internet for me and pulls every coupon code it can find and applies it at checkout and makes sure I get the best value.  THIS HAS BEEN A GAME CHANGER FOR ME.  I used to stop what I was doing and go google forever trying to find a coupon code while I would shop to make sure I wasn't missing sales.  I swear to god this app was made just for me.  How it works is you have to go to their webpage sign up and install the chrome plugin into the toolbar, and every time that you go to checkout while you are shopping Shoptagr will stop you and ask you if you would like to check for any discounts.  It will then run all the discount codes it can find through the website until one sticks, and if several stick it will only apply the one with the highest discount.  The other day I posted a denim H&M dress that people have asked me about for years that they recently restocked, when I went to checkout to check for a discount it pulled a $10 off coupon code.  

Another amazing feature it has is while you're shopping you can save items that you're interested within list you create in Shoptagr.  You put a notification on those items and when the price drops Shoptagr will notify you so that you can get it at the best price.  I CAN'T EVEN TELL YOU HOW MANY THINGS I'VE GOTTEN ON SALE THAT I WOULD HAVE PAID FULL PRICE FOR BECAUSE OF THIS SITE!!! So when I tell you I genuinely love Shoptagr I mean it wholeheartedly.  Y'all know how near and dear getting a deal is to my heart and pockets,  and it's like this app was made just for me and I love it.  So if you do not have the app or are not signed up DO IT ASAP ROCKY. 

Hopper

This one does not relate to clothing but it does save you hella money so I decided to throw it into the mix.  We all know that traveling right now is a touchy subject and if you are able to travel flights are pretty cheap.  Although that may be the case currently there are still times during the year, certain days of the week, different moments the wind blow when different airlines lower their flight prices.  Unless you are someone that travels regularly it's not likely that you would know offhand when those times would be.  Many people follow different cheap flight company twitter accounts and stalk them to find out when flights will drop.  Although, this may also work you could also sign up for Hopper and put the dates and specifications of the flight you're looking for and hopper will actually notify you when the flight price has dropped.  They even now have an option where you can freeze the price for a specified amount of days if you don't have the money at that exact moment so you don't miss out on the lower price.  I have used this app for every flight I've taken in the past couple of years and it has found me the cheapest every single time.  Another amazing coin saving hack.  So when the world opens back up and we feel a little more comfortable shopping I'll be right on the next cheap flight out to lay on an island with somebody's son (my boyfriend to be exact lol).

Well now that I've shared my top tricks and treats I really hope you give them a try.  All of these sites are free to sign up.  If you end up trying any of them out definitely let me know, and if you have any other cost-saving hacks I'm not aware of please spill the tea and let me know.  Each one teach one right?