Editor’s Note: My helpful hints today on iVillage are all about navigating Black Friday – when to dive in, when to bow out, and how to prep for battle. In that spirit, I thought I’d have our Sale Spy, Roxanna, give you some tips on my retail Achilles’ heel: the clearance store! I have yet to master these bargain bastions, but now that I have her tricks in hand, I just may give it another try!

Sale Spy’s picks: Leather Combo Blazer, Cut 25, $346.99 (reduced from $495) / Crossbody bag, Steve by Steve Madden, $46.80 (reduced from $78) / Medici Coat, Anthropologie, $149.95 (reduced from $298)

Roxanna K.K. ~ Everyone can shop in ritzy boutiques. With their racks of carefully edited merchandise and judicious use of white space, they’re a piece of cake. But only die-hard sale hounds can shop at clear-out retailers like Marshalls, Nordstrom Rack and TJ Maxx. This is where you become a shopping ninja.

Now I know many people are overwhelmed and intimidated by these stores – the unending racks of jumbled up merchandise shoved together like sardines, the fluorescent lighting, the nonexistent service. But trust me – there are amazing deals to be found here, people. It just takes a little courage and a lot of chutzpah. Luckily you have your trusty Sale Spy to guide you through the process so that you, too, can score the best finds without developing a migraine in the process:

Read on →