Discounts- are they a real bargain or just built into the mark up?

Many businesses offer 15% off your first order or if you sign up to a newsletter to encourage you to buy from them. Pricing of products are different for every business and we put a lot of thought into how we chose to cost our garments and it was hard not to follow others down the discounting road as it's a proven method to increase sales. When you get a discount you feel like you're getting something extra, it appeals to our reward part of our brain and it's something the fast fashion industry thrives on. 

             (above pic, I am cutting samples and Dakotah is checking stock)

We decided to look at it in a different way, valuing each person who is part of our production system and paying them Australian wages with all the benefits. We then make the garment a price that covers those expenses, keeping it as low as we can to be competitive, despite paying much higher make prices than offshore produced labels. It is a challenge but certainly doable!

We also value our stockists who as a retail store rely on making a retail mark up to pay all their expenses and to keep offering their customers a great in store experience. We don't want to undercut them, we want to work with them and have both of our small local businesses thrive, rather than compete against each other. Working together as a sustainable community is far better.

          (our very full stockroom)

We have people email us and ask about discounts so I thought it was time to explain where we are coming from. A couple of times a year we do a clearance, this is a genuine clearance and we only clear items that have been around for at least 12-18 months, items that we only have a scattering of sizes left and we haven't sold for a while and don't wish to keep that style ongoing. We mark them down 50% off and they stay that price as it's a fantastic discount and you can grab yourself a great bargain. We don't wait a couple of weeks and take a further 20% off etc or wait till you purchase then send a follow up email to offer a discount off your next purchase. I feel ripped off when I get offered a discount voucher just after I have made a purchase. It makes me feel like I paid more than I needed to. 

So the clearance section on our website is a place that you can always look for a special, we pop things on there during the year and if we are adding many items we let you know in our fortnightly newsletter. We also offer our retail stores the option to have the same specials selling them at the same price. 

Free items...... yes we sometimes have items that we no longer need and we decide to give them away as part of our zero waste policy. We used to have a decorated stretchy belt called the Unique belt. I had a stack of belt bases that I didn't want to keep decorating. So we gave them away to anyone who wanted them. They were limited to two per order and it wasn't a gift with purchase, it was a genuine free giveaway, customers only paying the standard $9.95 shipping if that was all they were wanting. Many of you scored one or two of these belts and we loved that that experiment worked so well. If we have another item to give away we will let you know. 

(pic above is the rack of bamboo tops that have just been made. They are all individually checked for quality and all threads snipped before tagging)

I hope that this makes it clear how we price things and why we don't join the race to the bottom price. We want you to buy things that you need, things that you have thought about and know that you need in your wardrobe. If you happen to find an item on clearance that you have spied for a while, then I'm sure you will enjoy getting it at 50% off. But our regular ongoing styles will remain at the fair price and if you do some comparisons I'm sure you will see that those prices are very fair for the quality of the fabrics and being made locally, sustainably and ethically. 

Cheers,

Sarah

PS:- A couple of other things to be aware of.

Sometimes garments are sold as a reduced price but they were never the full price to start with! And some stores have been shown to increase the price when they offer a percentage off. All things done to trick you into thinking you're getting a bigger bargain.

Check the country of origin, this can be found on the care label stitched into the garment. You may have been led to believe that the garment is Australian made when it isn't. A common term used is 'designed in Australia' or 'Australian designed' which is usually just to hide where the garment is actually made.