My Shoe-Shopping Struggles Have Come to an End
I know, women are supposed to love shopping for shoes. But I don’t.
In fact, I hate it.
For me, shoe shopping is usually a disappointing and exhausting ordeal. It’s a struggle to find shoes in my size at all, let alone ones that look good, fit, and are affordable. I wear a size 10 medium, but it appears most stores believe that everyone wears a 7 or an 8, or else 10 wides. Sure, they put a few token shoes out there in other sizes and widths, but the selections are terrible.
I can easily spend an entire weekend looking at hundreds of shoes, and barely even find any to try on. God forbid I look for a shoe that, oh, I don’t know, matches something I already own. Or that’s in stock, or that fits…
I’ve whined about this before, and people suggested I try looking for shoes at Zappos.com. For some reason I resisted giving them a try, but boy am I glad I finally did.
First, they have free shipping both ways. Free! That took care of my reluctance to order anything I have to wear over the internet. (Because I usually have to send things back. I hate paying to try stuff on.) Second, they have an enormous selection, and you can search for shoes by size, color, style, brand, price, and width. (You can search by heel height too for women’s shoes, which is perfect for me because I can only wear shoes with low heels.)
So if you have a brand that’s worked well for you in the past, you can search on that and narrow it down by everything that’s available in your size. I found tons of shoes that interested me; for once the difficulty was choosing which ones I wanted to try on! I ordered two pairs (because I was afraid I’d like them all if I ordered more.)
They arrived, and both of them fit and looked good. It was like a miracle. One pair looked better with what I intended to wear them with, so I kept that one and sent the other pair back.
I was a little leery of the return process before I gave it a shot, but it turned out to be easy. There was even a notice saying that I could return unworn shoes for up to a year. I just printed off the label online, plopped the pair I didn’t want back in the shipping box, and dropped it off at the nearby UPS store. It was super simple.
I am now a total fan of Zappos.com. (And yes, those links are affiliate links.) They’re not paying me to rave about them like this — I’m just super excited about finally finding a place I can get shoes from. Seriously. I’m not even going to bother looking for shoes at brick-and-mortar stores any longer. And if Zappos ever goes public, they’re on my list of stocks to buy for sure.
Zappos is a dangerous place for the shoe lover. My mom wears a 10 and has also had difficulty finding things in her size. They do tend to always have tons of 7 and 8s. Glad you found somewhere that you can get your shoe on with!
Zappos was recently purchased by Amazon for something like 850 million. They must have been like you and found some nice shoes and decided to buy some stock.
Kate, yeah I had to really hold back. I can see where it could be dangerous.
Clint, bah I think I had heard that previously but forgot. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t the shoes though that got Amazon interested… The reason I like the thought of Zappos stock is because of their company culture and their willingness to improve their customer service using technology. Too bad I’m not as excited about Amazon stock, although I might consider them as well.
Zappos looks cool, but I can’t shop for shoes online. If they don’t fit, I get too disappointed and frustrated. But I know it’s a much-loved site by most women.
In the past, though, I’ve used Shoebuy.com (to get replacements of my husband’s shoes) which also has free shipping both ways. I like it because the prices tend to beat out DSW and because the site participates in a lot of the cash-back programs (ebates/cashbaq/mr. rebates) so that increases my savings.
Just one suggestion. If you ever decide to check it out, email me so I can refer you — that will get you a $10 off $50 purchase coupon. (Plus, if you refer 5 people, you get a $100 GC to the site.)
Abigail, that’s how I feel about shopping in the stores. I figure at least with the free shipping I don’t have to lug myself all over creation to potentially be disappointed. I’ll have to check out Shoebuy too. Although it’ll be awhile since I’m stocked up now. If the referrals last awhile go ahead and email me one now.
I will have to check it out! I, too, dread shoe-shopping, but it sounds like this site makes it a lot easier!
Tootie, hope it works out as well for you as it did for me :)