Over the past few weeks we’ve been talking a lot about the Cost Per Wear Equation, which is an effective way you can figure out if spending a little more on an item for your wardrobe is worth it.  The Cost Per Wear Equation also proves that sometimes spending less money can wind up costing you more!   I have a perfect example of this equation to share with you and how successfully it can work.

Below is a photo is of my sister Beth taken this past weekend.   She is wearing a coat that she bought in 2003. I vividly remember the day she bought this coat from J. Crew.   My sister just had a baby and a year earlier had bought a home and paid for a wedding. Needless to say, with all that she had going on in her life, spending $250 on a coat was a bit of a spending stretch. Yet, when she put it on she said, “I like the way I feel in this.” I knew she had to own it. She hesitated at the price, but took the plunge. It’s a good thing she did.

Flash forward eight years and she is still wearing that coat. It has no signs of wear and tear at all, even though we estimated that the average times worn since 2003 has been about 50 times…per year!  Multiplying 50×8 and she has worn the coat at least 400 times– and we’re both sure we’re being conservative with that estimation.

Therefore, this coat now costs her around .63 cents per wear.

Plus, she doesn’t see herself retiring this coat anytime soon.  It definitely has several more years of wear in it, which means that the .63 cents per wear breakdown will go down even further, and soon the coat will cost her nothing.

The next time you are considering purchasing something that is definitely a stretch buy, think about my sister and this coat. Granted, there is always a gamble involved when putting down (what YOU consider) a serious amount of money on something.  Yet, if you have the reaction like my sister did when she put the coat on, then that’s a sign that you need to own it.

So, take some time to think about how you will wear the piece. What my sister could identify back then was that the coat was not only something she loved but she also saw how often she would be wearing it. It fit her lifestyle, her personal style, her physical characteristics and her goals. And, as I always say, everything you buy should work for these four features of your life.

Oh, and one more thing…on a personal note.

I wanted to mention something dear to my heart. My sister Beth is currently fighting a rare disease called Sarcoidosis, which is a potentially fatal inflammatory disease that can appear in almost any organ in the body. Although the lungs are affected in more than 90% of patients, the disease often attacks the heart, eyes, central nervous system, liver and kidneys. The cause remains unknown and there is no cure.

Currently, It is an underfunded, under researched disease that few people know about. My sister suffers from the rarest form of all, Neurosarcoidosis which is a complication of sarcoidosis in which inflammation occurs in the brain, spinal cord, and other areas of the nervous system.

I urge you to become aware of this disease and do what you can to support finding a cure. Please check out the Foundation for Sarcoidosis Research for more information. Thanks!