Did you say designer sample?

I am a mother of 4 children, three girls and one boy with ages ranging from 7 months to 7 years old. I choose with great care the articles of clothing that garnish their wardrobe. To me, this is one of the sweet pleasures of motherhood.

I discovered the L’Enfantillon boutique at the beginning of the year totally by chance. I had been searching online for a specific brand of clothing and was led to their site. I was instantly awestruck by how different from other children’s clothing stores their merchandise was !

I do admit I found the name a little strange at first… until I truly understood its unique concept. Enfantillonis a contraction of the French words enfant and échantillon, which means kid and sample. The boutique offers European and local designer samples at a fraction of the price!

Designer sample?

I had a vague idea of what designer samples are: fashion designed prototypes that are created prior to the mass production of collections. I thought maybe they were clothes that had a few faults in them. That was a plausible explanation as to why they were so kind to my budget. I was quite wrong … sort of.

The sale of designer clothing samples is nothing new. The creators have always tried to increase their return on investment by selling these items at cost price. The ultimate objective here is to cover the costs for making the pieces. That’s why a store such as L’Enfantillon can offer these products at such low prices.

Samples are pieces of clothing presented to potential buyers. They serve the purpose of showcasing the collections to come and are superior in craftsmanship and overall quality to the final in store products. Often times, the designer will leave out some of the details or change to a lesser quality fabric when the pieces are produced for the mass markets. This is done for the sake of cost reduction, of course. Buying a sample piece at L’Enfantillon will ensure that you are buying a top quality, select piece of designer kids wear.

While shopping around at L’Enfantillon, I noticed that each designer offers his pieces in 2 or 3 different sizes only. For them, the ultimate goal is to present baby, kid and teen collections. They don’t need to produce each size for that. Even though that can seem somehow frustrating when you shop at L’Enfantillon, it allows you to discover new brands as your children grow.

I’m gonna try to help you find the many hidden gems just waiting to be discovered at the store. So, I invite you each week to read my blog post and to join us on Facebook to comment, ask any question you have and share your personal experiences with us.

Which makes me curious… Did you know about designer samples and are you tempted to buy some?