The Wear-Out Budget

A yearly clothing budget built from what actually wears out: count, price and life by category, set against the planner's percentage split in points, with a five-year calendar for the lumpy years and a test for any dearer piece

PearlLook's Wardrobe Budget Planner splits a yearly total 25% tops, 20% bottoms, 20% outerwear, 20% shoes and 15% accessories, and never asks how many pieces you keep, what you pay for them or how long they last. The same 20% goes to shoes whether they wear through in two years or last ten, and nothing on the site builds a clothing budget from what actually wears out. The pack does that, category by category: count times price over life is what a line costs a year. Example: a wardrobe of 12 tops, 6 bottoms, 2 coats, 4 pairs of shoes and 8 accessories costs $610 a year; shoes are 29.5% of it, not 20%. Put $600 through the planner and the shoe line comes out $60 short while outerwear and accessories each hold $40 more than the year wears out; no combination of the priority boxes fixes it. Then a five-year calendar finds the year a coat falls due and the starting balance a set-aside needs ($120 for two $200 coats), care is priced against the life it buys (an extra year on $90 shoes is worth up to $15 a pair a year), and a $60 top has to last 4 years to cost what a $30 one lasting 2 does. It does not say what anyone should spend or judge any total, it says nothing about bodies, and it names no brands. Every figure is an example computed by our calculators' own code. Included: 7 steps, a rotation sheet, a split-against-need sheet, a five-year calendar, care and dearer-piece cards, reference tables, a quickstart, and a personalised sheet worked from the numbers you enter in our calculators.

Look inside

Two full pages from the pack, exactly as printed. Click either to read it at full size before you decide.

What is in it

• Step 1: the split is a guess: what the Wardrobe Budget Planner divides, and what it is never told
• Step 2: the rotation count: count, price, life and wears a month for every category
• Step 3: count times price over life: each category's year, its share, and the month rounded up
• Step 4: the planner's split against your need, in percentage points, and why no priority boxes fix it
• Step 5: the replacement calendar: the year each big piece falls due and the starting balance a set-aside needs
• Step 6: care priced against the extra life it buys, with the break-even per piece
• Step 7: the dearer piece: price per wear by category and the life a pricier version has to reach; no wears, no answer
• Working pages: a rotation sheet, a split-against-need sheet, a five-year calendar, and care and dearer-piece cards
• Reference tables: a year for one piece by price and life, the planner's shares with priority boxes, and the arithmetic on one card
• A personalised sheet worked from the numbers you enter in the Wardrobe Budget Planner and the Cost Per Wear Calculator

The pack picks up where the free Wardrobe Budget Plannerleaves off. The planner splits a total by fixed percentages and never asks how many pieces you keep, what they cost or how long they last; the pack builds the year from those three numbers, category by category, and sets the planner's split beside it in percentage points. Then it lays the pieces that wear out in lumps on a five-year calendar with the starting balance a set-aside needs, prices care against the extra life it buys, and uses the Cost Per Wear Calculator to work out how long a dearer piece has to last. It does not say what anyone should spend, it says nothing about bodies, and it names no brands. Every figure in it is an example for you to replace.