It may only be the end of January, but the year seems to fly by in the world of retail. Now sooner has the last piece of tinsel been taken down than the shelves are heaving with chocolates, hearts and flowers. Valentine’s Day may be over for most in just 24 hours (unless you have a particular romantic partner who’s whisking you off for a sun drenched week in the Maldives!) but for the shops it’s yet another reason to tempt us with a whole array of goods for weeks and weeks before hand. Valentine’s cards, heart shaped novelties and Belgian chocolates fight for shelf space with the every growing range of Easter Eggs on sale each year. No sooner is Easter done and dusted than we’ll be encouraged to buy for Father’s Day, to stock up on seasonal summer goodies, then the kids will need all sorts of things from the back to school range before the shops once again start putting the tinsel up again for the three month count down to Christmas! Phew! Although I’m a self-confessed shopoholic and easily tempted by all the seasonal goodies, I sure am glad that I don’t work in retail, as I really don’t think I could keep up. I struggle to get everything done and sometimes feeling I’m living weeks ahead of myself as it is, but I draw the line at getting into the Christmas spirit in August!

I know January is supposed to be the time for reflection, resolution and making a fresh start, but in terms of shopping I think the real fresh start comes around February. The sales are finally drawing to a close, the shops have all their fresh new exciting stock and fashion ranges in and rather than thinking what we’re going to buy for all our relatives, we can start to turn our attention back to ourselves a little bit (it may sound terribly self-centred but we all need to treat ourselves once in a while). Combined with the days starting to get longer, all the bright vibrant colours in the shops always help to lift my mood, because you can think forward to the spring and summer and I know it won’t be too longer (although you never can tell with British climate) before I can put my chunky jumpers to the back of the wardrobe for another year. The shops seem to come to life again and everything looks so appealing. It sometimes coincides quite nicely with the fact that the Christmas debts are finally beginning to be cleared and we suddenly feel there’s a little more disposable income for treats (depending on how overboard we went at Christmas). Then there’s all the Easter eggs and things starting to clutter up the shelves, which does drive some people mad, but as long as they’re not on display in January I always see them as indicative that we’ve turned a corner and we’re on the way to bigger and brighter things!

Apparently they’ve named today ‘Blue Monday’, because they say it’s the most depressing day of the year. I don’t know who ‘they’ are and I don’t know how we stand a chance to be cheery, if before we’ve even started our day we’re being told we should be feeling depressed! But, let’s face it, January isn’t the most inspiring month of the year and add to that, all the rain we’re having, the wind and the long dark nights and who can blame us if we tend to feel a little bit miserable. So, I’m all for a little retail therapy to lift the blues. Shopping is an activity that can be enjoyed inside, away from the elements - in fact, if you’re inside a shopping centre it could be blazing sunshine outside for all you know! Add to your trip a little break at a café for coffee and cake and you can really make a day of it. Who knows, you may even snap up a few bargains in the end of the sales, which is sure to bring a smile to your face. Personally, my mood is lifted simply by returning home with a couple of bags from my favourite shops with a new top or two tucked inside. Does that make me shallow? Well, as I look out of the window at yet another wet January evening, I don’t care. Any kind of therapy must be worth it and the retail variety is a lot cheaper than some!

As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t see myself as the luckiest of shoppers when it comes to sales, but then I suppose that’s because I compare my experiences with those jammy types who always seem to get their hands on the most incredible bargains without even breaking into a sweat! I think my problem sometimes is that I sometimes find it difficult to identify real bargains in a sale situation. So, I go into a shop in non-sale season and I can easily pick out my favourite items (unfortunately I usually can’t afford them!), but once a sale starts everything just looks so different. Sometimes the items I’ve had my eye on for weeks don’t look half as tempting when they’re crammed on to a clothes rail which is practically groaning under the strain and is full of an assortment of styles and colours of garments that are really doing nothing to complement each other! Then I see things I haven’t seen before and I’m sucked in by the fact that something that was once £18 is £3. Before I know it I have a few garments draped over my arm and I’m heading for the till. This is the point when I could really do with someone sensible, practical and frugal by my side saying ‘Do you really need it?’ I must admit, I’m getting better at asking myself the question and putting things back, taking a deep breath, walking out of the shop and not looking back, but I still seem to come home with countless t-shirts and jumpers I’ll never wear, simply because they were cheap. And don’t get me started on jackets! Admittedly, most of them are lovely, but there really are only so many jackets a girl can wear!

So, with the January sales well under way how many bargains have you managed to pick up? Does your wardrobe now boast a few well-selected designer bargains that you’ve snapped up at amazingly low prices? Have you had your eye on a certain dress or that must-have pair of shoes for the last few months, but you’ve patiently waited, biding your time until you knew it would be marked down in the sale and it’s purchase would give you an even greater buzz because of the cash you’ve saved? Well done is all I can say. My experience of sale shopping tends to be a much different one to that. Sure, I’m not saying I haven’t picked up a real bargain in the past that I’ve gone on to love and cherish, but more often than not it doesn’t work out that way. Ok, so I try to be sensible - I see an over-priced pair of boots that I adore and I think to myself why pay that inflated price when they’ll probably be a third of the price in a month or two? So, I wait, I keep my eye on them and go in to the shop each time I pass and to make sure they haven’t been reduced. Then the sales start and I return to the store excitedly imagining what outfits will be instantly transformed simply by teaming with my fantastic new boots. I go into the shop and everything is all over the place, then I see them. It’s almost like they’re gleaming at me amongst all the chaos. I rush over to them and pick them up - size 6. Ok, put them down, pick up the next pair - size 5 and so it goes on, but still I can’t bring myself to accept that there is no pair in size 4 waiting for me to slip my feet in. The disappointment overwhelms me every time. So, now I have a new policy. I’ll still wait until the sale if I don’t have any particular night out or event to wear my desired item to before that time, but if it’s part of a must-have outfit I’ll snap it up there and then and at least when my size is still available in the sale (as it always is if I already have it), then I can console myself with the fact that I’ve already worn it 6 or more times and it’s no longer quite as amazing as I first thought!

Currently, my main local Tesco store (I specify main, because Tesco is fast becoming like McDonalds in that they’re springing up on every corner!) is undergoing some sort of reorganisation. I wouldn’t go so far as to say refurbishment, because as yet there is no sign of cosmetic uplift. But things are being moved (quite often a bone of contention in itself when you’ve finally got to grips with where all the produce on your regular shopping list is housed). They are whole aisles that are completely bare, the other aisles are shifting location and instead of the usual professionally printed signs suspended from the ceiling directing you to the aisle you need, there are ordinary bits of white paper stuck haphazardly to the ends of shelves telling customers what they’ll find if they venture further down the aisle. Now, this may seem daft, but it spoils my supermarket shopping experience slightly and not for the reasons you may assume. It’s not so much to do with the inconvenience, but more to do with the presentation of the store. Ridiculous really when you consider that I can still buy everything I’ve gone in for (although it may take slightly longer to find), but I suppose it goes to show how much we really are sucked in by all the additional marketing and presentation. While the store is undergoing this transition, I’ll simply go in and get what I need, getting out as quickly as possible. Where all the usual bells and whistles in place I’d be more inclined to stay and browse, probably leaving the store with a couple of items I really don’t need! So, I suppose if the presentation of my supermarket is so important to be I should be eagerly awaiting the result!

Personally, I have a real problem with Crocs and this latest incarnation is quite frankly, hideous. Ok, to be fair to Croc fans, I know they have a practical purpose if you’re jumping on and off boats - we played count the Crocs on our summer holiday in Cornwall - but as a fashion item, it’ll take a lot to convince me…

January is a rubbish month isn’t it? It’s cold, rainy, dreary and you usually have even longer to wait for pay day, because you’ve been paid early in December. To make matters worse, you’ve overspent at Christmas so the month really seems to drag. It’s almost as if some of the shops can’t be bothered to make an effort - as though they think - no one’s got any money so what’s the point trying to entice them with tempting displays! Sure, there’s plenty of reduced stock on the supermarket shelves, but what I’m talking about is the attention to detail, the presentation, the ‘Wow’ factor. It just seems to be missing. And, what makes it even more apparent, is the fact that it comes straight after all the Christmas decorations and festive displays. I just think the shops look forlorn in January. It’s kind of the equivalent of taking your Christmas tree, cards and decorations down and your house suddenly looking really bare. But, the difference is, I see this as a chance for a fresh start - I have a good old clean and maybe brighten things up with some flowers. So come on shops, with so many of us suffering from S.A.D in January, don’t give us more reason to feel blue!

Happy New Year! Or, should I say Happy Sale Season. Yes, it’s Sale time again. No sooner have we polished off our Christmas dinner and sunk back onto the sofa to watch a film than the shops are dragging out rail upon rail of sale stock and putting big money off banners up in their windows. The Next Sale always seems very popular, with people queuing in the night to be there for the 5am opening. Now, what’s that all about? I never understand (not least because I don’t buy an awful lot from Next), why people can’t just turn up at normal time to take a look at the sale. They’re obviously desperate to be first through the door, but why does that have to be at an unearthly hour? It’s the poor staff I feel sorry for - retail’s no fun around Christmas. I can appreciate that if you’re genuinely up for a sale there are some great bargains to have, but as with sales in most clothes shops, they wheel out all the tat from years gone by that has been festering in the stockroom since the last sale! I for one, can’t be bothered to search through it all, while other customers push and shove to get past me. I much prefer to wait until all the fuss has died down and have a more leisurely browse at the remaining sale stock at the end of January, beginning of February, when the last items will be reduced even further and you can still pick up a real bargain. So, what about you? Are you a Sale Sucker?