In this posting, I will discuss my recent trip to The Jersey Shore Premium Outlet Mall. Outlet shopping is amazing because you can find high end items for sale and you can find bargain items for even cheaper. You should definitely visit these malls during big holiday sale times, such as the 4th of July, after Thanksgiving, and Presidents’ Day.
A couple of weeks ago, my friends told me about a high end outlet mall that opened earlier this year. I had never really gone outlet mall shopping, so I was eager to learn more about this mall. The Jersey Shore Premium Outlet Mall, located in Tinton Falls, NJ, has about 120 stores. The stores range from extremely high end stores, such as Burberry, Marc Jacobs, Juicy Couture, and Cole Haans, to more mainstream stores, for example: Gap, Banana Republic, Nike, Puma, Calvin Klein, and etc. A great benefit of this mall is that people over 50 get an extra 10% off at select stores.
One of the first stores we visited was Juicy Couture. Honestly, I am not a big fan of this store because I don’t like terry cloth sweat pants because I would feel like I’m wearing an uncomfortable towel. Also, I don’t like the Juicy Couture logo and design, I find it a little gaudy and (for some unknown reason) it reminds me of middle school. I had never been to Juicy Couture before, and I thought paying $80 (and this is the SALE price) for a pair of uncomfortable sweat pants was ridiculous. Needless to say, I will never go to this store again.
My friends are big fans of BCBG clothing, so we went into that store. They had a great sale on their dresses, everything was 50% off. I didn’t find anything I liked but I did enjoy trying some of those crazy dresses on. The next stop was J. Crew, where the polo shirts were only $12 and came in assortment of colors. And after that, we headed to Banana Republic. They had a big clearance sale, but I didn’t think it was that great.
My friends and I ventured into the Burberry store even though we knew that their outlet prices would still be way out of our budgets. My friend even tried on a pair of 5 inch Burberry heels. The outlet price was almost $350, and those shoes were 40% off. I looked at a cute Burberry wristlet, but of course couldn’t afford it because it costs $200. I do like the design and quality of Burberry, but I probably will never afford it – not even the outlet prices.
We visited the Godiva store because I love chocolates! Here, the price of the 36 piece Gold Ballotin box, that I love giving as gifts, for only $30. (The usual price is around $40-44, so you save at least 10 bucks!) I found the prices of the smaller chocolates, like the chocolate bars and little boxes of chocolates were the same at a normal Godiva Boutique. But the big gift baskets and large boxes (the 50+ counts) were at least $20 cheaper in the outlet stores. While here, I signed up for the Godiva Chocolate Rewards card, which is an amazing treat! This card is free and has lots of perks to it. For example, you get a free piece of chocolate every month, free online shipping (one per month), and a gift if you spend over $10 per month. I’m really glad I signed up for this card and I think all chocolate lovers should!
The Lindt outlet store had even bigger sales than Godiva. For example, you could get 10 bars of chocolate (and yes, there is an assortment to pick from) for only $15. Although this is a great deal, I suspect the chocolate is pretty old and therefore, will not taste that great.
One of my favorite stores was the Converse Shoe Store because I love these shoes. In fact, my goal is to collect them in every color. (So far, I have them in green, black, white, red, and one pair in high top black.) I was happy to find that the prices were very reasonable, ranging from $5 (yes that’s right, only FIVE Dollars!) to the normal price of $40. They had the usually assortment of solid color shoes, but I liked that they had some very uniquely designed pairs that I haven’t seen in stores. They also had Converse clothing (which I am not a big fan of) for cheap prices. For example, a converse t-shirt was about $7. My friends and I visited the other shoe and athletic store – Puma and Nike – and found their shoe and clothing prices to be reasonably ranged as well.
Unfortunately, I had no money for this shopping adventure, but I do plan on going back soon!
Other great outlet malls to go to include the Jackson Premium Outlets in Jackson, NJ (They have a Coach store and my friend once got a Coach wristlet for only $20!), Jersey Gardens in Elizabeth, NJ, Atlantic City Outlets in Atlantic City, NJ. I think these are the bigger outlet malls in New Jersey, but you can find a whole list of outlet malls at http://www.outletbound.com/usa50.html. I suggest you visit the mall webpage of the mall that you plan on visiting because they usually have the list of even bigger sale days for each store and a list of special events. Also, you can find out if they have senior or student discounts.
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