5 Tips for Shopping on a Budget by Laura Lily

The CGS Team is excited to share with CGS members a special guest blogger for today’s post! Fashion Blogger Laura Lily is sharing with CGS members her top 5 tips for shopping on a budget. The words below are Laura Lily’s!

If you are anything like me, shopping on a budget is part of your lifestyle. Sure, we all want designer handbags, but in reality, we also want to be able to pay our rent every month and take a well deserved vacation here and there. So here are my tips for shopping on a budget:

1. Know Your Budget

How can you stick to a budget if you do not create one? Sit down and decide how much you actually HAVE to spend. Not how much you WANT to spend. We always go over our budgets unless we stick to one specific number.

Help yourself by only caring that amount of cash in your wallet. Leave the credit cards at home. It is too easy to overspend if you don’t have to see the cash leaving your hands.

Avoid store credit cards. These little monsters will eat up your savings and cause you unneeded stress when the bills start coming every month. Plus, the interest rate is never friendly.

2. Know What You Are Shopping For

Write a list of the items you need to buy, and if you stay within your budget for those, go ahead and shop for what you want to buy. If you wander into a store aimlessly with no direction, you may walk out with a bunch of crap you’ll never wear, an empty wallet, or worse… buyer’s remorse.

So stick to your list and know what you went it for. Often times I won’t even walk into a store that does not sell anything that is on my list. Why cruelly temp ourselves?

3. Bring a Friend

Someone that will STOP you from shopping, not one that will encourage you to buy everything and just return it later. That never works. I always tell my friends to be the little voice in my head and remind me what I am saving for.

For example “Remember, Laura, you want to invest more money into your business,” or “Don’t forget you want to take that vacation!”

Having this little voice helps set your priorities straight and remember your long term goals which will easily overcome the short-lived, instant gratification of buying something you don’t need.

4. Know what you already own

This is so important, whether you have a great photographic memory or if you have to write it down or take pictures. Take a second to think if you already have something similar in your closet.

This tip may be what keeps me from shopping more than anything else. Think to yourself “Do I already own something similar?” “When was the last time I wore that similar piece?” If the answer is “yes” and “not in a long time” then put the piece down.

No one needs more of something they already have one of unless you wear it ALL THE TIME to the point were it is worn out and you can’t wear it out in public without embarrassing yourself.

5. Resist the Impulse Buy

My final tip may be the hardest to pull through. I’ve struggled with it myself. The thrill you get by going to the register and swiping your credit card can be an adrenaline rush.

But buyer’s remorse lasts so much longer. Resisting an impulse buy can be a tricky thing to overcome. But give yourself more time to think about your purchase by putting it on hold as long as the store will let you.

If you don’t think about the item again, then you really didn’t want it to begin with.

Thank you for reading. Make sure to check out my blog www.LauraLily.com for more fashion, beauty, + shopping tips!

xoxo, Laura

Follow Laura Lily Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and YouTube.

Also, add Laura in the CGS community @lauralily

Related: 6 Shopping Sites for Women on a Budget