Where are the best places (online) to get brand named (Nike, Asics etc) on sale?
Can you set a notification for when sales come up?
My little girl is starting kindergarten next year so I have time to get her new bag etc. & feel better getting them on sale.
Also after opinions…. Is it important for them to have these going into primary school (NSW)? From a peer point of view she has already noticed that some kids as her daycare have the ‘tick’ on their shoe & has asked why she doesn’t. When they’re little with the rate that things get ruined/grown out of we have just stuck with good old Kmart. Unfortunately I feel as though I am setting her up to be picked on if she doesn’t have this stuff as she goes to primary school. Maybe not just other kids but also their parents….
I do notice though even people I would think are worse off than us financially still manage to buy $90 shoes for their (growing) little kids. We just haven’t wanted to. We try & get our kids to value recycled bikes from the tip, camping holidays etc. but I just feel it’s inevitable as they get older to compare themselves & be compared.
I’m really interested to hear your point of view on this.
Do you fork out the funds regardless of how long they last?
Can you not justify the price?
Do kids get picked on for these reasons?
How do you educate your children not to be materialistic?
How much can I expect to pay for shoes, school bag etc?
What brands have you found last well (shoes especially)?
Btw I do know that quality shoes are better for growing feet & that may be the important factor for some!
Tips, advice, thoughts welcome!
13 Replies
Nope it's not. In my opinion good support shoes are important for their feet BUT at the end of the day they'll grow out of them every 5 months anyway so don't go investing hundreds.
Kmart bags seem good quality. Good size.
Everything gets bashed up and lost, so yes find the quality that works for you but it won't always be brand names.
Drink bottles I definitely prefer cheap over Smiggle. I've already chucked our Smiggle ones and bought 3 dollar Kmart ones. The ones with a hole at the top, no straw, no fancy pop top just plain.
I buy my kids brand named shoes and clothes from op shops. They are actually cheaper than new Kmart items a lot of the time.
Me too! I've bought Adidas, Nike, Roxy, Billabong and The North Face clothes/shoes for as little as 50cents.
For me, shoes are non negotiable and I pay into the hundreds for really decent pairs for my toddlers. Feet are so important, they’re forever growing but I always have 2 really good pairs of sneakers and two really good pairs of closed toe sandals.
Then we have some cheap pairs for outside from Spendless or Big W.
It isn’t about the brand names for me though, my kid’s wouldn’t know anything about them at all. They have a huge mixture of clothes, a majority from Shein or the op shops :)
The best drink bottles are Nike ones! I have tried Smiggle stuff and not a fan, I much prefer Kmart or proper bento brands etc!
The elitist brand name bullshit doesn't usually start until later in primary school (like grade 4 to 6), at least in our experience anyway. I've tried really hard to teach my kids not to buy into that rubbish, mine are all teens now and they like the popular, name brand stuff as much as any other teenager but they're realistic about it and just as happy to get kmart/big w stiff as well.
I do think a supportive, good quality shoe is important for school. They do spend at least 6 hours a day, 5 days a week wearing them!
Having said that, I don't necessarily feel like an exorbitant price tag or a popular brand always makes for a good shoe. In fact, my daughter currently has a pair of Nike's that she said hurt her feet and the bloody velcro won't stay done up so she has literally gone back to wearing her kmart/everlast brand ones that cost less than half the price 🙄
You have to live within your means too. You get the best you can for the budget you have. A friend of mine just had to get each of her 3 kids new Nike everything at the start of this school year - backpacks, lunch bags, drink bottles, shoes, socks, the whole shebang. She'd have spend $500 easy. A fortnight later she mentioned to me that she needed to borrow a few hundred off her parents to pay her electricity bill.
It probably will be worth your while getting yourself a Rebel membership, you can often get kids runners for around $49 (membership price) which is fairly reasonable.
I am so lucky with my kids. My youngest is nearly 18 and none if them care about brands only style of clothes. I don't think it was anything I did it's more the school they went to, small town and a very good mix of kids from all backgrounds, a lot of kids had very little and the more well off kids that did have brands didn't like to gloat or make a big deal of what they had. You can't make fun of someone's school bag if they don't have one. My kids will happily buy clothes from Kmart or OP shops. Even I remember the whole brand name thing in late Primary School so I'm really pleased my kids have skipped that phase as it means they are not wasting money on crap. I personally wouldn't go near it for kindy, wait for your child to ask for it and even then I would set a budget. Shoes with ticks wouldn't be naturally appealing to a young child so it really wouldn't be something a child genuinely wants. There's no need to spend more than $100 for shoes on anyone. You are paying for the brand beyond that.
When I was a single mum with no job I went to an op shop and found a Roxy jacket for $3. It looked brand new. I remember one weekend a mum from school made a comment asking how I could afford it being a single mum with no job...it was less than a cup of coffee that's why! So those mums who are buying brand name items may be getting them from op shops or they could be gifts. They're not necessarily spending $90.
I agree.
I found a practically brand new pair of Nike air max shoes in exactly my daughter's size at Vinnies.
I paid $7 for them, went home and googled them and they were originally $180.
Anything else brand name my kids have was usually given as a gift from relatives or they bought it with their birthday/Christmas money.
So it's really best not to concern yourself with how other people may or may not be able to afford brand names.
I hated that attitude when I was a single Mum, even though I worked I still copped it. I bought myself a new car with a bank loan so no special treatment at all but I got the whole "wish I was a single mum so I could get a new car". Umm no bitch this was from my own hard work. Isn't it funny how single Dads don't get the same attitude.
I still remember getting a beautiful baby onesie that was an expensive brand name as a Christmas gift. It would have been at least $100. I got comments about why would I buy that when he's just going to grow out of it...I had to explain it was a gift and I didn't pay a thing. I hate how people just assume if you have brand name things for kids you're wasting your money.
Please don't feel like you HAVE to buy your kids brand name items. Most people I know only buy branded stuff to keep up with the Jones's.
My kids primary school actually had a proper heavy duty school bag available for sale from the uniform shop. It was a $60 outlay but they were so sturdy they lasted the entirety of my kids primary school years and I was able to sell them once we no longer needed them. If your school has one of those, I'd 100% recommend getting one. Well worth the investment!
If not, let your daughter pick her favourite character bag from Kmart or Big W. That's what a lot of little kids have from what I've noticed and they are absolutely brutal to their bags in the first few years at school.
My high schoolers have gone with Nike and Target bags and they have held up well. I don't expect I'll need to replace them.
Shoe brands my kids have tried over the years:
Nike - paid $69. Massively overrated.
Adidas - paid $49. Durable but weren't overly suitable for wet weather.
Plain black leather Asics - paid $70. Excellent quality, would definitely buy again but kids complained they were dorky 😂
New balance - paid nearly $100 but they survived a whole year.
Several pairs of kmart/big w/spend less shoes ones - paid somewhere around $25 - $30 for each. Quality and time they lasted was on par with the nikes and adidas.
My girls have also had Grosby, Lynx, Sketchers leather Mary Janes style shoes. Paid between $40 and $100 for those and all were virtually indestructible but they grew out of them quickly so I stopped buying them and stuck with sneakers.
I have bought brand name shoes and have spared no expense for my daughter in regard to footwear because she has very slim feet and high arches and issues with her feet that are inherited, so getting department store shoes wasnt even an option as they almost always run wide. I find the outlay is worth it because even in infant school where they are in the sandpit constantly and putting a lot of strain on their shoes running everywhere, the only time I've ever had to replace them is when they've been outgrown. Everything else is Kmart, Target and school uniform store branded and she doesn't stand out amongst her schoolmates, even in what's considered to be a very affluent area. At our school most kids carry the school's bag from the uniform shop, which was $60 and looks great almost 5 years in. In our school shoes must be mostly black or mostly white, they can wear runners every day as long as they meet the guidelines. I wouldn't worry too much about getting brand names in anything else but making sure she's got good supportive shoes that are suitable for spending the day running around.
What you teach your kids is what guides them for the rest of their lives. If from this age you're teaching them that to be accepted you have to have xxx brand, you're not just teaching them that they're nothing without xxx brand but to also exclude kids that don't have it. And then they grow up to be the adults that have to have xxx brand and will go into debt for it if they have to. You don't want that for your kids. You know that.
Spend where it's warranted. Good shoes (my son wore a lot of Grosby shoes and most of his joggers were from Rivers), a quality jacket for Winter, a good strong bag for school, nutritious food in their bellies.
When they come home with a "Jenny said my water bottle is the wrong one", you simply state "Does your water bottle hold water? Yes. Does it leak water all through your bag? No. Sounds to me like your water bottle is doing the job we bought it for. They're all made in the same place anyway, just have different writing on them". Your kids will learn it's nice to have a few name brand things (and they'll treasure them) but that they're not a necessity.