I hate shopping. I've never been one of those girls that likes to go shopping for hours upon hours, browsing the sales racks, staring at endless window displays. and trying on clothes just for the hell of it.
That just doesn't appeal to me.
I'd much rather just pop into a shop, grab what I need and get the hell out of there. (You know, so I can go to the food court...)
But what happens when you don't know what you're looking for?
I like the idea of window browsing, but there's just all those idiotic people who are doing the same thing that ruin the experience by walking slow, chatting on their mobile phones, and/or smoking.
Most people would say that this is where virtual shopping comes in. Surely I could just go online, or browse around an online, virtual mall.
The problem with this is, I'm not a fan of virtual malls, and the problem with online shopping is that you need to know what you're looking for, don't you? You need to enter in a bunch of search terms and wade through the shit.
To avoid this, I'm told I should be using Veedow.
What's Veedow you ask? Well, it's apparently "shopping without searching". Which sounds amazing, doesn't it?
Basically, how it works is that you sign up to Veedow, you give them your gender and age, and then they show you a bunch of products that they think you'll like. Initially, yes, it is quite irritating that because you're female and 25 they assume you like wine and handbags - but it's not always like that. See, Veedow only knows what you like if you tell it what you like and don't like.
If they've suggested that you might like a fetching pink dog bowl, and you don't have a dog and certainly wouldn't own a dog that liked pink bowls, you simply click, drag and drop it into the virtual trash bin.
If you do like something, you can either buy it, add it to your wishlist, and/or give it a high rating using their nifty starring system. But, the key is that you have to tell Veedow what you like and don't like. You have to help it help you.
It takes a whole two minutes to sign up to Veedow, and once you're in - it's pretty straightforward.
What they suggest isn't always spot on, but they're certainly not just suggesting crap as they work with over 250 merchants that include, to name a few:
- All Saints
- Apple store GB
- Benefit Cosmetics (UK)
- La Senza
- Mothercare
- Nike iD
- Swarovski UK
- Waterstones
Not too bad, eh?
My only complaints about Veedow would be that upon my first experience of shopping without searching, the trash can was a bit buggy as some of the items just got stuck next to the trashcan if I didn't put them directly on top of the trash bin icon.
Also, sometimes even after I threw something away, it would pop back up again like a zit that just won't die no matter how many times you pop it.
But other than that, it seems pretty solid.
We'll be doing a series of posts about Veedow and finding out if it really is, as the kids in California would say, all that and a bag of chips. Stay tuned!