We have all been there: standing in front of our closet or dresser drawers, looking at the contents, and waiting for something to emerge. That surprising dress or just-so shirt. That pair of pants that fits like it was tailored. That pair of shoes that is the sort of pair of shoes people refer to when they advise their friends to judge others on their shoes.<\/p>\n
Once in a while, a surprising, just-so, tailored-seeming, universally impressive article of clothing appears, though rarely of its own volition. The rest of the time we just stare.<\/p>\n
Maybe it’s time to go shopping.<\/p>\n
Last week, I spoke to Tracy\u00a0DiNunzo, serial entrepreneur and savvy founder of\u00a0Tradesy.com<\/a>. She delivered one of those stunning statistics about halfway through our call: most women (her business focuses exclusively on women’s clothing) use only about 20 percent of their wardrobe each year. (One\u00a0source has it at 30\u00a0percent<\/a>, but still.)<\/p>\n What this means is that, not only are we spending a lot of money on clothes — in the U.K. that number is said to be about\u00a0$1,000 a year<\/a> —\u00a0and in the U.S. figures of\u00a0$125,000 over a lifetime<\/a> have been bandied about — but we are also tying up a huge amount of value in our closets. IKEA says it’s over $1,500, although I’ll bet many could assess the retail value of their wardrobe at lots more than that. According to\u00a0Tradesy, their clients have a whopping\u00a0$12,000 in closet retail value. (Mine is probably more like $20k or $30k, but I do still have lots of my work clothes from my life as an investment banker.)<\/p>\n So we have what could be 70-80 percent of a quite high number sitting there, unused. That, said\u00a0DiNunzo, is what inspired her to start her business. “If this is true, why aren’t women selling and monetizing the other 80 percent? It’s too hard,” she said.<\/p>\n Ok, it’s probably never going to be a profit center. (Unless you’re super savvy at yard sale and thrift shopping or have a ton of hand-me-downs.) But your closet could pay its own way, especially if you haven’t done a purge in a while.<\/p>\n We’ve covered\u00a0closet\u00a0cleanouts<\/a> before, so I’ll be brief on the how-to:<\/p>\n 1. Divvy.<\/strong> Mark out some time in your calendar, preferably a weekend or an evening. If you can, says\u00a0DiNunzio, “grab a friend and some champagne and some music — cleaning your closet is a miserable thing, and you may as well make it fun.” She recommends (and I do, as well) having someone with you to help you make decisions; “we’re not as objective about our own closet,” she says. Go through everything and make four piles of clothes\/shoes\/accessories:<\/p>\n According to\u00a0DiNunzio\u00a0and other closet organizing types, you should have a goal of “purging at least 50 percent\u00a0of what you’ve got; your keep pile shouldn’t be more than half of what’s in your closet.”<\/p>\n 2. Sell.<\/strong> The thing about selling clothes is that, while I would never suggest spending a lot of time shopping and a lot of budget on designer clothes, the better quality (and more recognizable brand name) your clothes are, the higher percentage of retail you’ll be able to get when you sell them. But there are also ways of getting back your value (or better) if you shop at thrift stores or yard sales (or, yep, even free boxes). Here’s how I’d do it:<\/p>\n 3.\u00a0Systemize.<\/strong> I’ve heard this advice before (never used it, but I admire it greatly!): separate and restock the closet with the clothes you’re keeping, putting them all the same direction on the hanger and shoved to one side; theoretically, you’ll have plenty of space! When you wear something and put it back, move it to the back and turn your hanger around. At the end of the year, the things you’ve never worn can go up for sale, too. Do it all over again!<\/p>\n DiNunzo\u00a0surprised me when she said her surveys show their customers actually spend more each year on clothes while using\u00a0Tradesy\u00a0actively, by about 20 percent. My own spending depends a lot on how much I’m taking in; in years when I’m making upwards of $40k, I’ll spend $1,200 or so on clothes; other years I spend as little as $200, mostly in socks and running shoes. (I’m a sucker for pretty wool socks.) When I don’t have a lot to spend, I get most of my wardrobe from clothing exchanges,\u00a0free boxes<\/a> and thrift shops.<\/p>\n So I’d love to know from our Get Rich Slowly audience, who probably spends far less than the typical shopper: how much do you spend each year in clothes?<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We have all been there: standing in front of our closet or dresser drawers, looking at the contents, and waiting for something to emerge. That surprising dress or just-so shirt. That pair of pants that fits like it was tailored. That pair of shoes that is the sort of pair of shoes people refer to when they advise their friends to judge others on their shoes.<\/p>\n Once in a while, a surprising, just-so, tailored-seeming, universally impressive article of clothing appears, though rarely of its own volition. The rest of the time we just stare.<\/p>\n Maybe it’s time to go shopping.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3092,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[488],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.getrichslowly.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162597"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.getrichslowly.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.getrichslowly.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.getrichslowly.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3092"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.getrichslowly.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=162597"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.getrichslowly.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162597\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.getrichslowly.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=162597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.getrichslowly.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=162597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/span>Can I turn my closet into a profit center?<\/span><\/h2>\n
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<\/span>How much do\u00a0you<\/em> spend on clothes each year?<\/span><\/h2>\n