Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-12-17


Is science in shopping that few women
understand. even the most indefatigable of
bargain hunters. The time that women
waste hunting bargains is worth more in
actual money than they can save by find
ing the lowest prices.
The science of shopping consists in
buy and where you are going to buy 1t.
The merchants who spend tens of thou
sands of dollars in advertising their wares
understand this, but most women do not.
The woman who tries so bard to econo-
mize in money should understand the econ
omy of time and steps.
The best way to do a days shopping is
to begin the evening before and prepare
carefully list of exactly what you want
or need. If you do that you will seldom
be led into the temptation of spending
more than you intended to spend-whieh is
one OF the pitfalls that beset women. Per-
haps half the women who go shopping pur-
chase somethins-perhaps more than one
article-that they never had intended to
buy and not infrequently they discover
that the money carefully calculated to
pay for the needed articles was spent for
things that were not needed and that the
allowance has been strained.
After the list has been prepared take the
evening paper and go over 1t carefully
reading the advertisements and jotting
down opposite the articles on the list the
name of the store and the price advertised.
Complete the entire list this way. Then
make route of the shopping district cal
culating just exactly which store to start
at and where to finish the excursion with
the least waste of time and energy.
The shopper often will find to her surprise
figuring up the bargains that perhaps
she can find everything in two stores with
in short distance of each other by pay
ing few cents more for some article and
can figure that the time and effort are
worth more than the pennies.
Having done this, 1t is best to map out
= in your mind the location of the different
, departments in the stores. In the great
shops of a big city knowing the locations
of the counters and departments is a vast
help. 1t saves time steps and temper to
lay out a route from department to de-
partment. and 1t would pay any woman
who has much shopping to do to familiar
ize herself thoroughly with all the big
stores.
This systematizing of shopping will en-
able a skilled shopper to buy more and to
better advantage in mornings shopping
than locker can buy in whole day.
The locker not only wastes her own time
and frequently her own money, and always
her own nerves, but the time and temper
Of the clerks and other employees. She
wanders through the stores looking for
something, having only a vague idea what,
and then while at the other end of the
store suddenly remembers what 1t was and
retraces her steps. In some of the stores
one can waste a miles walk in an hour by
this method Also the locker without
system always is the one that is tempted
to buy the pretty and useless things that
she finds afterward that she did not need
or want. rs
System. list and a good knowledge of
the geogra ply of the shopping district and
the stores themselves will save money.
One
Woman attributed the turning point of her
life to the habit of keeping an expense ac-
count. She said that her help had come
from realizing suddenly one day the ap-
palling number of what she believed to be
vital things that were left out of it.
The looking over list of expenditures
from this point of view sometimes turns
out to be a startling revelation of chances
missed for development. Things that are
not entered in 1t have to be taken as a
fair criterion of things that we are trend
ing away from. Music, theaters, opportu-
mites made for social life. little outings,
books, flowers. charities one or all, are
believed by most people to play a part in
their lives. There are few who would not
scorn the idea that they are not infinitely
ahead of the pleasures to be found in dress
eating. new luxuries in the parlor, new
conveniences IN the kitchen. And yet out
of the average fair or what would be called
living income the last items will fill almost
the entire list
Looked over many of them will seem to
have been INDUCED in superiuously. when
comparing their value to that which has
been missed The practical evidence of the
pages refutes all the pretty theories as to
what we love, by showing that we love
dress better or good eating, luxurious sur
roundings, show an easy life of yielding to
luxury or laziness, any of them enough bet
ter TO spend the money for these.
An unusual if pessimistie, view of this
principle was taken-by one who was an in
people with you, why is it that you don't
oftener take some one who would never go
any other way?" she was asked.
Because that would be the one that I
wouldn't confer any benefit upon" was the
answer. People who never go are people
who don't care to go. The one who really
loves to go will get there some way"
The thing that we spend money for is the
thing that is getting the upper hand of u.s.
1t is the accurately true test of that which
is becoming the strongest habit of the
energies.
After all. money spending is only habit
which, in spite OF ideas to the contrary can
be changed from that which is sordid to
that which is uplifting almost as one would
change from one morning paper TO another
1t requires only an effort of the will Is IL
not up 10 you TO make It?
That
Fine promptness which pays small sums
due the peope who serve her at the earliest
possible moment is the hall mark of the
best type of gentlewoman. 1t Is the
noblesse obllge spirit which counts the con-
venience of those worse off than herself as
of more importance than her own or that
or others better Off
1t sometimes is the fault of the sheltered
woman that she is good deal of an auto
crat In money matters, and thinks people
are only doing the part expected of the
worker when they await her pleasure. This
attitude naturally results sometimes from
oohging Willingness and obsequiousness on
the part OF tradesmen. To follow Il with
larger bills of larger houses does not harm
anybody else, though the one who falls into
FL