6 Ways to Save at Luxury at Department Stores

How to save money while shopping at luxury designer department stores like Saks Fifth Avenue, Bloomingdale’s Neiman Marcus, Bergdorf Goodman, and Nordstrom.

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Are you still paying full-price at luxury department stores? There are so many ways you could be saving on your luxury department store purchases, from signing up for loyalty rewards programs, to using cashback sites to earn a percentage of your purchase back. Continue reading to find out my favorite ways to save when shopping at your favorite luxury department store.

Sign Up For Emails

The most obvious of my advice is to sign up for emails. Some stores reward their newsletter subscribers with special discounts just for signing up as well as early access to their sales and shopping events. It’s the easiest way to save money on designer brands; in most cases, you can just pop in your email and get at least 10% off.

Keep an eye out for savings events

Almost all of the popular department stores have friends and family sales, after-Christmas sales, and buy more, save more events. Some also have VIP sales for top-spending customers but since we are focused on saving more and spending less, we will want to focus on the seasonal sales offered to everyone. These are the times to shop for what’s on your luxury wishlist. Most hot ticket items will sell out early on in the sale, so to make things easier on yourself, I recommend creating a wishlist on each site and adding the items you’re eyeing for easy and quick access come sale season.

Sign Up for Rewards Program

More and more high-end e-comm stores are implementing rewards programs to incentivize shoppers to shop on their sites. Even if you’re not a loyal shopper at a particular store, it makes sense to sign up for the free rewards programs, so you can earn points when you do shop that will turn into discounts, rewards, and other perks. I will be doing a roundup of the best rewards programs offered at high-end department stores soon, so subscribe to the newsletter below, so you don’t miss out!

Use Cashback Sites

Signing up and using cashback sites like Rakuten and Jewel is one of the easiest ways to save money on every purchase. You’re basically getting paid for shopping. There’s no minimum purchase and earning rates change often but if you’re planning a big shopping trip at a specific store, I suggest trying to catch the item on sale and when the cashback rate is the highest to get even more savings. I’ve been a user of Rakuten for years but I’ve just discovered Jewel and they seem to have more luxury sites with higher cashback rates. Click here to sign up for Jewel using my referral link; you will earn $5 cashback just for signing up and I will receive $5 for referring you. You can also sign up for Rakuten using the link here and we will both get $20 back.

Check Your Credit Card for Savings Offers*

recent offers from my cards

If you hold a reward or cashback credit card, chances are the bank also offers incentives for shoppers. For example, my American Express and Chase cards both have a section in the app that have rotating offers, such as more cash back for shopping through their portal, an increase in how many points you can earn per dollar during specific times, or special discounts at various stores just for cardholders. I recently saw an offer for $50 off any order of $200 or more at Farfetch. That’s a really good deal for a high-end e-comm store that can be used on full-priced items or even better, stacked on sale items to get an even larger discount.

Open a credit card at your favorite store*

Do you have a favorite retail store? Mine is Nordstrom, so I applied for their store card to take advantage of perks I was missing out on by using other payment methods. Cardholders receive the best benefits such as a better rewards rate that earn them points faster, the ability to choose a personal double points day to maximize on larger shopping trips, and early access to seasonal sales, just to name a few. If you’re loyal to a specific store, why not check to see how you can be rewarded for that loyalty?

*This tip is for those who are able to use credit responsibly. If you’re not able to pay off the balance in full, I do not recommend using credit for discretionary spending.