I'm a member of Heels.com's affiliate program and they must have been reading my tweets and posts on iheartretail.com about last-minute shopping, because they sent me the following email yesterday:
Place your order between 6:00 PM Eastern on December 22 and 6:00 PM Eastern on December 23 and you will receive a free upgrade to overnight shipping. There is no code necessary, and no minimum order size required to receive the upgrade. Just add any item to your cart, proceed to check-out, select a delivery address within the Continental US, and relax! Your order will be delivered by December 24th, just in time!
As an affiliate, they pay me a small percentage commission on any orders that come from by blog. If you want to know more about how affiliate marketing works and how you can get involved, drop me an email at ncsulilwolf@gmail.com and I'll give ya the skinny. I plan on also doing a mini-series on my business blog soon about this topic!
I've been telling a lot of people lately about how it's actually not THAT hard to go eco-friendly, and even cruelty-free altogether (no animal skins or furs), with shoes and accessories. (Seriously y'all, it's Easy Being Green!) So I thought I'd share some resources that make it easy-peasy to find eco-friendly shoes - and a few of my favorite recent eco-friendly finds.
"For those who have tried, finding non-leather shoes can be a daunting, almost impossible, task. Specifically for those kind individuals, here's a collection of vegetarian shoes for secure, cruelty-free peace of mind. With advances in synthetic manufacturing, non-leather materials are now virtually identical to their genuine counterparts, but with none of the guilt."
You can even leave your email on that page to be notified when new vegetarian products are added. Genius! (That's also REALLY smart marketing right there.)
Zappos also has a kick-ass e-commerce feature which allows you to show product results based on categories of your choosing. I chose womens, eco-friendly, shoes and received 476 results - http://www.zappos.com/womens-eco-friendly-shoes~g! The only problem is what flies as "eco-friendly" isn't always cruelty-free. Zappos does do a great job however of describing their products well and detailing what all parts of the shoes (upper, sole, etc.) are made of - and I appreciate that.
I'm really diggin' Timberland's new "Earthkeepers" collection, but they're not leather and suede free unfortunately. Timberland would totally have my vote if they were using recycled leather like they are recycled PET (plastic bottles). I would have no problem buying shoes that reclaimed leather from old shoes instead of using new leather, for what it's worth.
They have a fun ad campaign running for this line, too:
Both shoes retail on Zappos for $194 - see each online by clicking on the images above.
The Timberland Earthkeepers Granby ($174) (pictured below) would also be flawless if not made from suede.
Now here's a cool winter boot from The North Face which is cruelty-free and made from recycled raw materials!
According to the site, the sole's are pretty high-tech, too:
"Durable TNF Winter Grip ™ rubber outsole with Ice Pick™ temperature-sensitive rubber snowflake lugs. Ice Pick™ rubber hardens when the temperature falls below freezing to provide ultimate biting traction".
Keep reading for more shoe finds later in the week!
I'm going to go on the record here and tell y'all that my homie Sonny Byrd actually came up with this idea first, but apparently someone outside of the States beat him to market. (I'm still encouraging him to be first to market here in the US, for what it's worth ;-).) (And in full disclosure, I have no idea if he was really first, but let's just all be good sports and assume he really was.)
Back to the post at hand here, Sonny sent me an email this morning with the following subject line: "FML". He was a little bummed to see the following site making waves in the fashion world before he could.
Garmz is a site that allows designers to upload their designs to the site, have the population at large vote on them, and possibly some day, see them go to production. Garmz then shares the sales revenue with the original designer. The concept totally breaks down the barriers to entry typically found in the fashion world and can potentially get trends to market seasons ahead of traditional fashion houses and retail brands.
I do NOT love round or platform toe heels. I can deal with round toe for a super cute shoe (I have found and purchased maybe two of these, ever, so they do exist), but I can NOT deal with an overly-platform toe. They just remind me too much of stripper shoes.
There. I've said it.
Give me a pointy-toe (or peep-toe) or nothing at all!
{Images: Bakers shoes - which I do like as a brand, just not all the round, platform toe shoes; Nordstrom; Zappos}
These are super cute, too: Maybe a little high at $75.00, but I would totally pick them up if they went on sale at Macy's. Also available in black.
PS: Update for Lisa S. and my mom (who asked if I was hinting at these for Christmas). As some of you may remember, I made a commitment to not purchase any leather goods anymore, because there are so many non-animal alternatives out there. Both of these shoes are leather products, so I wouldn't buy them for myself nor would I wishlist them. I'm surprised that both are actually real leather, to be honest. Many, many products now are made from vinyl or faux products, so keep an eye out for those and let me know if any look like these cute shoes. Love the style, not a fan of the raw materials. ;-)
Well done, Banana Republic! My little green heart thanks you!
"Greener. One Step At A Time. We changed our bag to eliminate 500,000 pounds of plastic each year. You too can help by reusing or recycling this bag."
My sister was outlet shopping last week and picked me up a great pair of linen-style black pants (trouser-style fit, draw-string but fitted waist) that look great with patent black heels that I wore today, but of course I can't find any pictures of outlet products on their site. I'll take an outfit picture next time I wear them for a follow up post :-)
I was reading over this week's fashion columns in the Lifestyle section of the N&O and was delighted to find an entire feature dedicated to RED! As all Wolfpack girls know, red is a statement color with free reign to wear at any time. This popular fall trend color happens to extend that privilege to everyone... regardless of their love for NCSU! ;-)
This feature was an affiliate piece from the Charlotte Observer (a sister publication of the N&O), so unfortunately it only included looks from national chain retailers... but I did find a few things to love!
http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/10/17/746749/red-101710.html?index=1 Love this belt from the September/October H&M collection! No price given, didn't see it on their website. (Random note: You can only shop online with H&M if you're OUTSIDE of the US? How often do you see that?)
I have to admit, I love watching to crazy Kardashian girls on E!. They're such hot messes, but some of their crazy antics remind me of my girlfriends and even my the ridiculous that my sister and I may or may not have caused on occasion. We hardworkin' ladies deserve a little mindless TV every once in a while, no? See http://officialkourtneyk.celebuzz.com/2010/10/kourtney-kardashian-mason-airport-nyc/ for brands that Kourtney and kiddo Mason are rockin'.
Anyways, it's sort of like Netflix for shoes. Except that they're not used and you get to keep them. Ok, so they're actually more like an assumed grocery delivery service/CSA program. Essentially, every month they send you personalized picks based on your style profile and then you pick a pair you actually want to own and it's shipped to you for $39.95 -- with free shipping. (And what they call "easy exchanges", but I can't speak for that... yet.)
The only catch is that you have to "skip" if you don't want the recurring charge (so from a revenue perspective they're probably banking on you just forgetting to do so within the 1st and 5th of the month), but for shoes... I feel like I could make this a regular thing. Or end up with a pair of shoes. Win-win? Yes, yes!
Today's recommendations based on my style quiz results (first below) that I would so say "yes" to:
The only thing that doesn't work on me is buying 12 new pairs of shoes in a year, potentially. As much as I love shoes, I actually don't buy THAT many a year. Again, I could make this work and not end up with 12 pairs of shoes... or maybe some great gifts for my fellow Size 8 ladies? (Actually, I think you can select which size you want for each order. So the gift idea would certainly work!)
So, what do you readers think? Sold? If I take the plunge and commit to the first pair, you can bet I'll be following up this post with a few pictures of the newly arrived shoe goodness and a review of the quality and ShoeDazzle experience!
I awoke to an email from my gal pal Kristin this morning sharing the LuLu's site with me... thank you, Kristin!
The site features dresses, shoes, tops, bottoms, denim, accessories, and jewelry, but I was totally sold on the dresses. There were over 500 on the site (500!) and I have yet to see one over $100.00. (Woohoo!) While targeting juniors, there are SEVERAL dresses that I myself would totally wear for a night out. Most are tiny dresses, so with fall approaching, lots of these would look great with tights or leggings.
Oscar de la Renta is one of my high-end favorites, so it was no surprise when I loved the back cover ad of this month's Traditional Home magazine (actually, it's technically the October 2010 issue)... it's a Lee Jofa home textiles collection inspired by De la Renta's fashion.
On page 34 of the magazine, there was an inset that read:
Ball skirts made with De la Renta's fabrics for Lee Jofa will be auctioned off to benefit Casa del Nino, a child assistance program the designer co-founded in his native Dominican Republic. For additional details visit LeeJofa.com.
ZGallerie.com (with a great sale going on right now!) is one of my favorites to "window shop" online for modern accessories and style inspiration (and they have someone super helpful running their @ZGallerie twitter account, too - they got me taken care of in less than a day when I couldn't join the email list)!
If you've been reading for some time, you know that I'm all about "voting with my consumer dollars" and that mark. is my choice for beauty products because they were one of the first to have a strong position against animal testing.
Launching a line of fair trade products? Just as cool!
Can't wait to get my hands on these. I hear the "Do the Right Thing" Smoothing Body Lotion with SPF 15 is going to be my new favorite because it's so much like the "For Goodness Face" lightweight moisturizer with SPF built-in.
If you want to check out this line, visit my mark page and search "fair trade" (I'd link it for you, but mark doesn't have the best options for deep-linking directly to products.)
I would NEVER spend $50 on a flash drive (especially when they often come free these days as merchandise add-ons and promo items), but darn if it don't want this thing!
PS - If I was a wine rep and was calling on restaurants, bars, and retailers daily to sell bottles of vino, I'd make my company buy me one of these... and put their logo on the bottle's label of course! :-)
Just a quick note to let you fab readers know that I'm hosting TWO giveaways this evening over on the facebook page for I Heart Retail (my new project I told y'all about back at the end of last year).
The gettin' is good... so make sure you come check it out!
This Tennessee-rooted Carolina girl is a force to be reckoned with... look out Lilly P.!
Caroline and I had the pleasure of attending NCSU together and wearing the same letters and now that she's back in Charlotte, NC, she has been a busy girl crafting this "little" business of hers (of course, not to mention holding down a day job in the crazy world of advertising).
I've been watching her grow this brand for some time now and just could not wait another day to finally give her a shout out here. So without further delay, here are some of my faves from her collection:
LOVE the lines of these yellow skirts
This print... must have it!
I'll take the dress, too!
Made for younger girls, however I'm formally requesting a grown up version, Caroline!
And this is one of my favorite pieces of hers... MOST favorite!
All on warehouse clearance, minus the media console! (Of course, not that I have any business going around buying lots of chandeliers right now... but a girl can always window shop!)
Place your order between 6:00 PM Eastern on December 22 and 6:00 PM Eastern on December 23 and you will receive a free upgrade to overnight shipping. There is no code necessary, and no minimum order size required to receive the upgrade. Just add any item to your cart, proceed to check-out, select a delivery address within the Continental US, and relax! Your order will be delivered by December 24th, just in time!
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