Outlet mall haul

Remember I mentioned that when Gus & I went on our little jaunt to Columbus, Indiana recently, we stayed overnight near the outlet mall? Well, this post is about the great deals we got!


We spent $440 and got:

• 2 pairs of jeans
• 8 shirts (6 of those were men's tall sizes)
• 2 pairs of shorts
• 2 leather jackets (one was Kenneth Cole)
• 1 pair of shoes
• 1 candle

Here's the breakdown:

At Wilson's Leather, we bought 2 coats that were originally $390 - but we only paid $89! How's that for a deal??


At White House Black Market, I scored a really cute pair of shorts for $15. Original price? $60. Seriously, who pays $60 for a pair of shorts?


I managed to control myself at Loft (one of my favorite stores), and only bought a shirt. Original price $30 - I paid $15.


At J.Crew (another one of my favorite stores), I got a cute striped shirt. You can't see it in the picture, but one of the stripes is a purple-fuschia color. They had cute colored jeans the same color, but of course, they didn't fit. Loft and J.Crew pants never fit me. Arghhhh. The deal on the shirt made me feel better though - original price $55, my price $17.


We popped into the Longaberger store just because I had never seen one at an outlet mall before and wondered what they carried and how it was priced. We snagged this awesome-smelling berry candle for $15 because we had a coupon for 20% off one item.

TIP: Don't forget to join the VIP clubs for the outlets. You get emails about upcoming sales, emails with extra coupons, and you can log-in on the outlet mall website and print out a ton of coupons.


I couldn't miss the Nine West store because I love their shoes! I scored these cute espadrilles on clearance (and used a coupon for an extra 10% off) for $18 - original price $89!


Gus really likes Eddie Bauer's clothes, and they're one of the few stores that carries a decent selection of tall sizes for men. I rarely buy anything there, but this time I found some shorts that were 70% off (plus we had a coupon for 20% our entire purchase) - so the final price was $7 (originally $30).


Here's the rest of our Eddie Bauer haul: I got a pair of jeans for $20 (originally $50), and Gus got three polo shirts, originally $24.99 each for about $10 each, three dress shirts that were originally $50 each for about $20 each, and a pair of $50 jeans for $40 (they fit so well that Gus didn't mind that they were full price minus the 20% off).


So what was our total savings? $560!! Yep, the original cost of everything was right around $1000, but we only paid $440. And even better? We only shopped for a couple of hours, so we had time to have a nice dinner, too!


So don't forget to sign up for a VIP membership at your local outlet mall (or whatever outlet mall you shop at most frequently). You can save a ton of money!!