lifestyle

The new online shopping trend that won't send you broke.

Just shut it down before sh*t gets real.

Last night I loaded up on $671 worth of clothing from the comfort of my own bed.

Oh, it was glorious. A satiny little jumpsuit, a long wrap dress and some new shoes. Add to cart? Don’t mind if I do. Hang the expense!

Then I shut my laptop with a satisfying thud, placed it on my bedside table and settled in to read my book, pleasantly flooded with the endorphins acquisition brings and blissfully free of the guilt that usually accompanies large outlays of cash on non-essential items.

This is happening online every second of every day.

It’s called “cart abandonment”, and I’ve been doing it at online stores the world over for years: shopping up a storm, then going offline before shit gets real.

According to Baymard Institute, a UK web research company, 67.45 per cent of online shopping carts are abandoned.

There are myriad reasons for cart abandonment.

It could be that there’s unexpected shipping costs, or that the shopper found a better price elsewhere, or that the website navigation was too complicated.

None of those apply to me.

$800 worth of clothing and shoes? I can’t afford that! I’ve got a cat to feed!

Sometimes, there’s an itch to consume that must be scratched.  I enter the store, and like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, grab just exactly what I like from the racks and throw them in my basket. No one can tell me I can’t have it!

I do put thought into it. I make sure items come in my size, or that expensive skincare will work with my sensitive skin. I read reviews. I love a sale, too. This is no supermarket sweep, I’m discerning.

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Since online shopping lacks the instant gratification of a new item that you get with traditional bricks and mortar shops, shutting the computer without actually purchasing doesn’t feel like a let-down.

Apparently, it’s generational. Some of Gen Y get as much of a kick out of saving the money as we do out of spending it.

I’ll shop when I choose to shop, thank you very much! You’re not the boss of me!

I’m the ultimate faux-sumer. I’m like a 1990s mall rat. Hanging around, dressed terribly (often pyjamas), never purchasing anything. Stoned. I’m basically Silent Bob.

Loads of retailers have cottoned on to the fact that they’re losing potential sales to tyre-kickers like me.

Retailers have tried to come up with ways to entice people to follow through, such as the friendly emails reminding me that I’ve just left my shopping basket at the till and wandered off, and that I’m only a few clicks away from sealing the deal, or even discounts.

You can’t make me.

To that I say thank you but no thank you, overzealous e-salesperson. My cart runneth over, and pay day’s still a month away.

Mia gets it. Listen to Mia Freedman talking about her own love of cart abandonment…

More on shopping, glorious shopping?

Going shopping? Here’s why it pays to read the label.

The best bit of shopping advice we have ever heard.

The eight things all online shopping addicts know to be true.