Do you shop at the cheapest place? The place that is locally owned? The name brand place? The place with the best quality? Or best customer service? Or some other reason?

What are the most important factors for you in decided where you will shop?

It depends on what I'm looking for.
Books - my first stop is a bookstore owned by a friend of mine.
Music - my first stop is a compact disc store owned by friends of mine.
Both are independently owned, not part of a franchise.

Food - my prefernce is the Farmers Market - locally produced food has less distance to travel, and I prefer to support local producers directly when possible.
Whatever I can't get from the Farmers Market, I get where I can get the quality I want for the most reasonable price.

Clothing - thrift stores are my first stop. I couldn't care less about labels - I care that my clothes fit me properly. I won't pay $150 for a shirt with a high-profile designer's name emblazoned on it, especially when I can get a perfectly good shirt from Goodwill for $1. I'll wear rags before I'll pay designer prices.

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Name brands really mean nothing to me. I shop for most of our food at Save A Lot and for clothing I start at the thrift stores and then end up at Wal-Mart to fill in the holes.

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My blog: As Simply As We Can

In general, I go for the most inexpensive. I do my grocery shopping at Walmart, but I go to Smith's for produce and meat once in a while - much better quality.

For clothes, I prefer Target over Walmart because it has a little less of a cheap feel, but is still really inexpensive.

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It's not what you make; it's what you spend.

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I will agree with inexpensive tends to rule where I shop. For food, I tend to shop at Kroger. For toiletries, diapers, etc. I shop Walmart. For clothes for DD, I will shop at the thrift store and fill in from Walmart. For myself and DH, I will shop at thrift store, Target, and Walmart.

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For food ... I always go with quality. I don't buy a lot of prepackaged food, I buy a lot in bulk, and figure I can put a little extra for quality. i usually shop at Safeway, Yokes, and Costco. And I often try to go with local with the Farmer's Market and other people I know on the side that sell different things.

For clothing ... second hand shops are great and then I will go to Ross or TJ Maxx for other stuff. I'm also a big fan of Macy's clearance rack. Though I have to admit, I've been finding so many good deals on thrift store clothing that I'm starting to object to paying clearance prices.

Books ... I love our local, independent, bookstore but I cannot always afford his prices. So I will go to Borders (always with a coupon) though I have started looking at thrift stores for books. You'd be amazed what I can find sometime for $0.59.

In general i go by least expensive mainly groceries. For clothes I try to find alot of things at garage sales and thrift stores. I do alot of clothes shopping for the kids at Kohls and Jc penney because of all the great clearance deals! I buy alot of things from old navy because they have alot of things i like and i have such a hard time finding things for myself I don't know why!

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I usually go where the lowest prices are.

well it depends on what i'm buying.

clothes I have certain brands I buy but only because they hold up and last longer nicer cotton stuff like that. I usually buy it on sale though.

food I buy where its the cheapest except for produce and meat those I want quality.

so in all there are several things that determine why and where I shop.

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