For todays What’s Anita’s Deal I would like to share my insights into finding cheap airfare for all types of domestic and international travel locations. Consider this my travel tip that is a gift that keeps giving if you’re a traveller like me!

BE as flexible as possible. Do yoga everyday and stretch after every workout so you can fit into ridiculously small nooks and crannies of the plane, like the wheel wells or other passengers luggage….just kidding ;)

What I mean is: be flexible for both times and locations. If you can travel an hour to another airport or even two hours. It is often worth it and will save you 100’s of dollars for simple car ride. Depening on the length of your trip this should have little to no impact on the quality of your travel experience, you’ll simply be launching from a different airport and have a slightly longer ride home when you return.

Contact a local limo company. Find the best airport limo service in your destination area. Occasionally you’ll get on the phone with someone that really knows what they are talking about. These drivers talk to passengers every day that are going to and from the airport. You better bet that they know the most about who is getting a deal, which air mile plans are best, when flights get cheap etc. When I travelled to Ottawa, Ontario I contacted The Ottawa Limo Company and got some great info on a local Canadian airline called porter. I was able to connect in las vegas to Ottawa for almost half the price of these other airlines. I simply took a look at the site they recommended and these Ottawa limo drivers knew exactly what was going on with great flight deals.

Search ACTUAL AIRLINE WEBSITES! I know you’ve been bombarded by dozens of hotwire, trivago, sexy hotel bonanza flight travel package deal zoo orangatang banana slinging red wire pink elephant websites. BUT, the reality is, these websites got into the game to make money from affiliate links to the airlines.

Use the aggregate website to find some promising deals and then go directly to the airline site to cut out the middle man and any fees he may be trying to separate from you and your wallet.

BE a night owl! You know how tomorrow seams  so far away? Well actually tomorrow begins at 12:01 tonight in the eyes of all airlines. So take advantage!

RESEARCH!

If your flight is cheaper the next day and you aren’t as flexible on dates, simply book a late night flight have a glass of wine, listen to some music, pass out and wake up at your destination like the pro discount traveler you are. Arriving just on time with cheap tickets to the best shows in town in hand!

Use time to your advantage. Know you have a trip well in advance? Tickets are often 4-5x cheaper if you buy them 3 months in advance. Hell! buy yourself an extra one just in case.

If all else fails, scout the American Airlines lines nation wide for an AAirpass. The membership that allows unlimited worldwide flights. Find a person with this, fall in love with them and never pay for a flight again. Practical right!?

Back to timing…and reality. Ometime tickets will drop. If you are booking 3 months in advance pick an airline that offers a low price drop guarantee. This way you’ll get the lowest price that comes out over the next 3 months. This isn’t available form all airline but has been introduced by Westjet and some Southwest flights.

How do you save money on flights? Let me know, contact me here!

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This post may bring some controversy. It’s no secret. Nearly all of the top clothing retail chains outsource their manufacturing to china. They employ thousands for way less money and feed the economy phenomenon that is the american consumer. the corporation grow, we perhaps save a few dollars but the it seams most posits are scooped up by big business.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m against child labour and believe in asking no more than an honest days work. This is however not the case for a lot of factories in china. SO please, in all your shopping ventures, follow a due diligence process to ensure you are not creating victims by saving a few bucks.

Some businesses have needed to go as far as creating suicide nets to prevent their workers from ending their lives as they see no value left in endlessly working themselves to exhaustion just to get up and do it again.

This is not the case with all factories in china. The reality is, americans are used to a different lifestyle our minimum wage has steadily increased while China has maintained an one for all all for one mentality of work for your family and country before your own well being.

Soo the bad news: Whether we like it or not, free trade laws have created a dynamic where the cheapest, best labour services have driven everything to china…The good news: 2015 has brought more power to the consumer not only to decide whether to support local independent or corporate

With all that being said, I’ll put away my serious face and put back on my shopping heels to let you know todays: What’s Anita’s Deal!?

How To Buy Clothes Direct From China

Several years ago a brilliant founder developed a website called Alibaba. A site where wholesalers can connect directly with merchants all over the world. For example, A Nashville restaurant owner could even order lobsters from Prince Edward Island. More commonly a clothing store in North America can source a branded or private labelled clothing item to purchase and resell at 500% markup in their store.

For years, the risk was huge. Contact a seller in china. Send over a minimum like $1500 and hope they return a quality product in a timely matter. The only secure way to go about this was to fly to china and meet with the seller at the factory to ensure conditions were up to standards and the product would be of high quality.

(Insert movie intro guy voice) Enter… the website the changed international e-commerce forever!

Aliexpress.com

Reach China sellers directly and order SINGLE ITEMS for as low as .25 a piece.

Know that swimsuit that you’ve been eyeing at the mall, the one with the 89.99 price tag. The hottest swimsuit of the season. Head over to Aliexpress. you’ll be looking at more like $8.99.

In fact, half of the “online boutiques” you find being promoted on sites like instagram and twitter are drop shipping directly from this site and making a quick 5-15$ per item.

Cut out the middle man.

Buy directly from wholesalers on aliexpress. The only drawback. TIME. It can and often does take 4-6 weeks for items to arrive from China.

It is, however, totally worth the wait.

Now tell me…when’s the last time a shopping blog sent you straight to manufacturer?

Check back soon as am putting together a post on how to get wholesale pricing from any company you want, even in North America.

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Amazon Prime Day!?

I recently watched a documentary that explored the history of the now enormous shopping website Amazon. It started as a simple idea. Let’s sell some books online. Quickly it grew into the largest book selling site and exploded the used book market. Today Amazon has reshaped the e-ccomerce landscape and products are search 4x more on amazon than on google!

This week marks amazon’s 20th anniversary and there is some talks to some unprecedented DEALS. Their official release claims they will have better deals than the infamous shopper holiday: CYBER MONDAY!

Needless to say I am pumped to see how deep these deals will go. IF I remember correctly, the deals will be released Monday July 15th at Midnight. Apparently this new shopping day will be known as prime day!

Go ahead set a reminder on your phone right now. Who knows what great deals will be available and how fast they will sell out.

One thing to keep in mind. You MUST be a prime member. Good news is that you can simply register a 30-day free trial and get a taste of how awesome shopping on amazon is.

What to expect? You may not know this but amazon purchases and resells 1000’s of their top selling items. Giving them a lot of room to adjust prices down to MSRP. With daily deal sites taking a big chunk of consumer spending from amazon. We might see some flash deals that will pop up throughout the day.

At the very least we know that amazon pays out their online publish promoters around 6% giving quite a bit of room to drop prices site wide if they choose to do something ground breaking like that.

Rumour have it that there will be sales in every category on amazon. If you’ve shopped the site before, you know just how massive the options will be.

Why I do 90% of my shopping on Amazon already.

Amazon was founded on the principle of proving the best possible experience for every customers. A difficult task when a HUGE umber of amazon sellers are independent sellers that have never step foot or been personally screened by an amazon facility.

They do however, accomplish this task and provide the most seamless online shopping experience available. Everything has a refund policy, prices are driven down by extreme competition in almost every category. Reviews keep sellers honest and other rubbers educated on which products are best.

It may seam childish to think that we all deserve the best and will not except anything less. But this is literally my experience every time I shop on amazon. The best toothbrush, the best dog bed the best hair brush….always reviewed, always categorized based on my budget, always delivered within stated timeline.

It’s probably too good actually, slowly causing us all to feel entitled but with the introduction of same day and even 30-minute delivery, I aint going nowhere!

SO if you take one thing from my over the top love letter to amazon, it’s that they have set the standard for online shopping and you should definitely give them a try.

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