The Student Guide to Navigating the Christmas Sales

Ailsa MacLachlan gives Lifestyle a three-step survival guide to making it through the Christmas sales unscathed.

Christmas: it’s a tough time of year for everyone. With waistlines expanding, long-lost relatives coming to see you just to remind you why they have been so long-lost from your life and the hassle of the numerous ‘Secret Santas’ that seem to overtake university life, Christmas could be seen by some as anything but a season of joy. But there will be one undoubtedly unforgettable experience during the Christmas season for any student with any instinct for saving money: the Christmas sales. Love them for their impressive cut prices or hate them for the shopping centres playing a game at your expense in attempting to fill the place to maximum capacity, everyone needs a few pointers to navigating the sales: here are yours.

1.  Timing. The age old rule. You have got to get there early if you are going to get any chance of grabbing that jacket you had been waiting to go down to half price, or be prepared for disappointment  in finding your size to have sold out. But when I say early, I do NOT mean a 4am rise for the 6am opening of the Next sale, no, no, no. You have got to get the balance between getting there in time to get the best items of the sale, whilst not being sleep deprived as sale gems could pass you by without so much as a glance. It also depends whether you’re prepared to shop on the hangover from the festive activities of the night before. The question is, is your hangover more important than getting a thrill from grabbing a bargain?

2. Stand your ground. There’s no denying that there will be other people there who have a lot more experience than you of cutting through the mass of bodies around the sale rails, but their years of experience won’t be able to make up for their lack of agility in their old age, therefore you have the opportunity to take advantage of this fact in the speed in which you get around the shops. There will be people who have no concept of PSS (Personal Shopping Space), but you are perfectly within your rights to stand your ground and keep perusing the rails at your leisure. You’re never going to see them again so you don’t have to pretend to be their sale friend!

3. Pick the people you go with wisely. You do not want a shopping companion who will be wanting to paw over every item on the rail, you want someone who is ruthless in their approach to sale shopping with a focus on what they need, what they want and what would just be plain stupid to buy even if it is 70% off. You also do not want someone who will complain about how much their feet hurt or how busy it is; take someone who knows the sale environment and has no expectations of a pleasant or peaceful shopping experience.

Follow these guidelines and there will be no need to be a headless turkey in this year’s Christmas sales.