Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Tocca Sample Sale Report December 2013

Hello chickadees,

Yes, I went to two sales in one day. I was about to go to three because I am a crazy person but I skipped Stella McCartney after buying all those candles at Nest. I barely made it back to the subway. There was no way I was walking the few blocks to Stella McCartney with my giant bag of candles. I probably wouldn't have gone without the giant bag of candles. God love all these brands for having their sales in close proximity on the same day but why do their offices have to be near Chelsea Piers? The only trains I can take are the C and the E. Which reminds me, the Tocca sale is being held from December 4-December 6 from 11:30am - 7:30pm daily at 542 W 22nd St between 10th and 11th Avenue. The sale technically opened yesterday but that's gone and done with so there's no use telling you now. My recommendation is to do the opposite of what I did and go to Nest before you go to Tocca if you're also planning on visiting both sales. There's just much more variety at Nest and you'll probably stock up on most of the things you want and then shop a bit more carefully at Tocca. Which isn't to say I dislike my purchases from Tocca but in hindsight, I might have preferred to get more candles at Nest and then return for Tocca fragrances tomorrow. But I'm rambling.

I was told not to take photos at the last Tocca sale I reported on (thankfully after I had pictures of most of the sale) so I was in stealth mode today. I have photos of the fragrance and body care displays but none of the clothes. Larger sizes are out in the front room and I'm assuming they go down to zero which means sizes run from 0-12. Now, this doesn't mean that you'll necessary find something that appeals to you as the larger sizes pretty much each have a small rack of clothes and from the size of the back room where the changing area is, I can't imagine it's much better for the smaller sizes. As for sizes 6-12, I mostly saw jackets and pants with a few dresses and other items mixed in. It was all very random. This really wouldn't be the sale I would go to expecting to find something special in the apparel section. It's more of a random luck situation.

Now to get to what you're probably interested in... the fragrances and body products. They carried body creams, solid perfumes, full sized perfumes, mini perfumes, 3 mini perfume sampler sets, hand creams, large candles, small candles, and little $10 sample sets of what seemed like all of their perfumes. I would not bother with the little $10 sample sets because if you want perfume samples, you can pretty much just go to Sephora and they'll make them for you without much of an issue. The other items were a bit more worthwhile. Other than in the main fragrance section I felt like one or two fragrances dominated each product section. I don't know if their stores were ransacked after the Friends and Family preview yesterday or if they never had that many of the other fragrances to begin with. What I mean is, the body creams were pretty much either one scent or another. The solid perfumes I think were mainly Stella or Florence. The hand creams were pretty much all Stella. The large round candles you see in the photo above were one of two fragrances. One was a dark blue and the other was purple. I can't remember which one was which but I think one of them had a Peach Bellini scent. It was lovely but I don't think it was worth the price. However, I'm generally less fond of sweet scents. I think there were probably less than 10 people shopping when I was there before noon. If you aren't already familiar with the fragrances, they've set out laminated cards explaining what notes are in each perfume.
Body Creams
Large candles (blue and purple containers)
Small candles (light blue square boxes)
Fragrances (at the far end of the table) The packaging is very pretty but a lot of the boxes have Nordstrom stickers on them and/or aren't wrapped in plastic.
Solid perfume
Fragrance
Body Cream

There are no coat or bag checks and you get a 10% discount if you pay in cash. Do I think this is a sale you need to attend? No. But if you're in the area, you might as well stop by especially if you or someone you know likes the brand and you're looking for some Christmas gifts. Perfumes that are normally $68 at Sephora are $45 at this sale without tax (or a shipping cost) and if you pay in cash, you get that extra 10% off. Not bad. 

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