Jambalaya

USA Travel Blog 6 - Shopping

For a while, a couple of years ago, shopping was probably the primary reason why non-business people visited the US from the UK. With the pound riding high at almost two dollars and with prices in the US generally being at or close to $=£ then virtually half-price bargains were there for the taking. Every item you buy makes your suitcase heavier and, if it was something you needed anyway, your trip a little bit cheaper! (in a perverse way of looking at things). New York City is an amazing place to do shopping. You could spend months there and still not have time to visit even the majority of retail outlets. The choice is staggering, the offering is of a high quality and the experience is generally superb. But what a lot of people don’t realise is that if you’re buying a decent amount of stuff, especially clothes, then you can save a small fortune just by popping over to New Jersey.

The state of New Jersey doesn’t charge sales tax on clothing and the overall rate is lower on everything. So, right off the bat, you avoid that typical tourists’ annoyance of choosing something for $100 and getting to the till to be charged closer to $110 because prices shown exclude sales tax which, in New York City, is the oh-so-easy 8.875%. New Jersey has an abundance of malls, several of which are located nice and close to where my sister lives. The best of these, in terms of savings, is the Premium Outlet Mall at Tinton Falls which, as you can see by clicking on that link, has a vast array of designer outlets offering premium products at discount prices. I spent a small fortune there and walked away with a large fortune worth of clothing.

The second mall we visited was the Monmouth Mall which again boasts a vast array of stores including J.C. Penney and Macy’s. For overseas visitors Macy’s is a particularly good place to shop because if you visit customer services with your passport they will give you an Overseas Discount Card which garners an 11% discount on purchases. If you’re shopping in New York that more than negates the sales tax and if you’re shopping in New Jersey it’s simply an added bonus.

Shopping in New York was, this time, limited to window shopping. Having bought up half of New Jersey, and with a bulging suitcase, I couldn’t really manage any more but that didn’t stop me taking an wander round Tiffany and Co. and the Apple Store, with its iconic glass cube entrance.

On the day we left New York to return home a Farmers market sprung up at the Rockefeller Center. Sadly it was too late to be able to enjoy any of their produce, most of which would have been illegal to bring back to the UK, but we wandered up and down and took a few pictures which would have to suffice.

So whilst the exchange rate is no longer as good as it was, it’s still good enough to be able to grab a great many bargains…if you know where to go.

And that really is all I have to say about my trip. Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed :)

Sweet!

Yeah, I encountered the best sweet shop in the world yesterday. Anyone who knows me will know I have a VERY sweet tooth and so, basically, pretty much anything containing sugar, syrup, honey or cocoa is fair game for me.

Anyway, I was wandering around town yesterday shopping with a friend when we bumped into another friend. We went for coffee and he mentioned a sweet shop nearby which sells all manner of sugary delights. As luck would have it, it was on the way back to the train station so we just had to stop by.

It’s quite small but it’s FULL of sweets from all over the world. America, Australia, Canada, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Sweden, Finland and more (apparently…I’m reading that off their flyer). I’m a big fan of various confections that are sold in the US but not here, such as Almond M&Ms and various members of the Reese’s Peanut Butter family. They have them all. And more.

www.cybercandy.co.uk is their URL and they ship all around Europe and to the US (for any USians who want non-US stuff, obviously) so if you don’t happen to live near one of their stores - locations in Birmingham, London and Brighton - then you don’t have to miss out.

But that’s not the reason they’re the best sweet shop in the world. No, that has more to do with my own profligate idiocy. While I was in there I must have put my shopping bag - shoes and eau de toilette - down to get my wallet out and then…noticed I didn’t have it when the train was nearly home. I felt truly dreadful - upset and angry with myself for being so stupid. So I went BACK into town, started in the sweet shop and, lo and behold, my bag was waiting for me behind the counter.

Not only do they sell the world’s best confectionery but they also offer an ad hoc bag-sitting service for absent-minded fools! And THAT is why they’re the best sweet shop in the world :)

Have you ever left anything behind somewhere? Did you ever get it back?