Guilty Secrets: UK’s Secret Shopping Habits Revealed
British women may love shopping for clothes and shoes – but almost half admit to having bought a pair of shoes they’ve never worn.
Recent research into the nation’s secret shopping habits revealed that 46% say they’ve splashed out on shoes they’ve never worn, and over a third (37%) have clothes hanging in their wardrobes that still have the price tags on.
It’s little wonder then that more than one in four have deliberately hidden a purchase from their partner, to avoid a bust-up, or that eight per cent of men have secretly binned something they found in their other half’s wardrobe.
Over two thirds (68%) of the women quizzed by High Street retailer Wilko were self-confessed hoarders and admitted that many clothes bought on shopping sprees rarely get worn and just gather dust.
Almost half of them reckon they have at least 100 items of clothing at home. And one in 10 say it’s over 250. They also have 18 pairs of shoes, on average, even though the vast majority (80%) admit to wearing just three or four pairs on a regular basis.
Men don’t buy as many clothes or shoes, and they’re much less likely to buy stuff they won’t wear, the survey revealed. And what men do buy they hang onto for longer. One in three have T-shirts that are at least 10 years old, according to the survey of 2,000 adults, and 15% have equally old pairs of jeans that they can’t bear to bin.
One in 10 still have socks or underpants dating back TEN YEARS or more, and only a quarter of men (24%) say they have more than 100 items of clothing. They’re also much lazier when it comes to sorting through cupboards and drawers to bin the clothes they no longer wear.
More than a third of women (37%) have a proper clear out every six months, compared with just 22% of men.
Jenny Graham, storage buyer at Wilko said: “It’s remarkable how many clothes are bought but never worn, leading to jam packed wardrobes, drawers that won’t close and disgruntled partners!
“Having regular clear outs and selling items or giving them to charitable causes is a great way to downsize. Once you’ve got rid of anything you no longer need and identified what you want to keep, clever storage systems make it easy to see and access your favourite belongings and maximise space. So no more forgetting about the stuff you can’t get to!”
People in Northern Ireland are the tidiest, with 38% clearing out their clothes every six months, compared with bottom-placed East Midlands (21%). And over-55s are much more likely (54%) to wear the same few clothes again and again than the fast-fashion loving millennials 18-24s (36%).
Wilko’s top 5 storage hacks:
- Use drawer organisers for make up, jewellery and other small items to keep your dressing table clutter-free.
- Label storage boxes and drawers with chalkboard sticky back plastic to be able to find what you need in a hurry.
- Use stackable storage boxes at the bottom of the wardrobe for shoes and accessories.
- Use sticky hooks on the inside of cupboard doors to hang hairdryers and straighteners.
- Get up to four times more stuff in your storage space by using vacuum bags to store away winter clothes and bedding. Just one wilko vaccum bag is big enough to hold a single duvet and pillow!
