Steve & Barry's

One of their mottos: "Fashion is not a luxury, it's a right." Amen to that!

Stephon Marbury (point guard for the NY Knicks) basketball shoes = $8.98
Sarah Jessica Parker sun dress = $8.98
Everything from large oversized men's hoodies to trendy children's t-shirts... $8.98 or under. Amanda Bynes, Venus Williams... and other big celebrity designed lines make up their fashion collections suited for all ages. How do they do it? If you want the long story, here's a recent NYT article featuring this 8th wonder for fashion deal junkies, or you can read up on their story detailed on their website. But basically, here are a few ways they cut the costs to benefit the consumers:

No outsourcing of the in-store displays. They do it themselves.
No advertising - they rely on word of mouth.
The corporate employees use discount hotels.
Strategically finding under-performing malls or retail centers to open their stores so there is some wiggle room to negotiate rent.

Bottom line, it just seems like these guys really care about saving the consumer some money. I like that... so I'll help 'em out by dedicating the first post to the kangdeals blog.

Check 'em out! Some local stores in the NY/NJ tri-state area include the Palisades Center Mall in Nyack, NY, Manhattan Mall in Mid-town NYC, and coming soon, a new store near NYU on Broadway! The family went to the one in Nyack last week. It's located on the first level across from Best Buy & adjacent to BJ's. Don't let the name of the store throw you off... it's actually called Steve & Barry's University Sportswear in this mall. It's kind of misleading because while the store started off as a college sports apparel store at UPENN, that's really not all it is. When you walk through the store, you get the same feeling you got when you first walked through H&M... overwhelmed by the volume of selection and bewildered by the cheap price tags, only here, you save time scouring the racks for price tags and you don't need to wonder if there is a markdown on the item that just hasn't been noted: EVERYTHING is $8.98. You just walk through the aisles and think, "eight freakin' ninety eight!?" The decor & displays are not as fancy, and you kind of feel like you're walking through a barn full of clothes. But I'll take the skimpy graphic design if it means saving some serious change on my clothes.

I should mention though, the "$8.98 & under" is just for a limited time. But I THINK the clothes will all still be under $10 once the promotion ends.