The Frau's New Fashion Find

It can be challenging to live in the world’s most expensive city when you are used to shopping at the biggest sale ever at Kohl’s 365 days a year. Not only are things in Zurich triple the price, but there just aren’t that many choices.

Coupons and discounts are few and far between in Switzerland, so the Frau grabs what she can. For instance, last week, she clipped out a coupon from Blick am Abend for 5X the Cumulus points at Migros. So needless to say when she was offered a voucher for Zalando, a virtual mall that delivers anything fashion-related right to your door for free, she couldn’t pass that by.

Over 23,000 shoes. The Frau isn't used to such choices!

First of all, fellow yodelers, there are over 23,000 pairs of shoes to choose from on the fr.zalando.ch website. Imagine the Frau’s dilemma. She hadn’t seen this much selection in Switzerland ever. It was almost like shopping at Target. She could search by size, color, heel size, type of shoe, and more. The only catch was, she had to do this in German or French as the site delivers practically everything except the English language.

Kein Problem. If she ever needed an excuse to improve her French or German, being able to shop on a site that offers no worries of customs tax is it.  And also no worries if the shoes or the almost 32,000 clothing items you can choose from don’t end up fitting. Because you can return them within 30 days for free. Free. The Frau likes free.

Speaking of free, Zalando even offers a toll-free customer service number. The Frau asks you: what other Swiss entity offers this? Call the SBB and you'll get charged CHF 1.19 a minute. You know the drill. In Switzerland, if you’re a customer and want help, it’s usually 1-800-PAY-US-MORE.

The Frau also likes sales. But why wait until July or January? If you’re an American cheapskate like her, you can go to Zalando just to search for sale items exclusively. Or for sale items and your favorite brand. 

Hint for all other shopaholics: if you sign up for the Zalando newsletter, you can get CHF 10 off your next purchase. The Frau already did, of course. Clip, clip. This coupon queen is in her glory.

Do you shop online in Switzerland? Any sites you like? Or other good deals to be had?

Shop online like it's 1989!

A few weeks ago, I wrote about five Swiss websites that could use a makeover. But this Swiss online experience perhaps tops it all:

My husband went to a photo workshop in Baden over the weekend and received a coupon for 15% off his online order at ProFot.

So naturally he wanted to shop since he needs very little incentive to buy photo gear.

He filled his virtual shopping cart and went to check out and realized something strange: there was no redemption code on the coupon.

Upon further investigation (i.e. contacting the company), he learned that to redeem the coupon, he had to either scan it and email it to them or get this...snail mail it to the headquarters in Baar.

Yes. Thanks to you, ProFot, people in Switzerland really can shop online like it's 1989.

Have you had any strange shopping experiences in Switzerland?

Grocery Shopping Online with leshop.ch

Now that I'm a mother abroad, I do things I never did before: like order groceries online even though I live right across the street from a grocery store.

Not only is it a little harder to get out these days, but I also had a coupon for a CHF 30 discount if I ordered at least CHF 100 worth of stuff from leshop.ch. To me, this coupon, along with Baby M, justified what could otherwise be viewed as complete and utter laziness. Also, as anyone that lives in Switzerland knows, it's not too hard to spend CHF 100 on groceries when maple syrup alone is CHF 7 and a six pack of Dr. Pepper is CHF 8.

Wait...Dr. Pepper?!!

Yes. Leshop.ch, which is Migros' online supermarket, has more selection than the actual store. For instance, you can buy wine, beer, and British food like American Doritos. Yes. I will forgive leshop.ch for categorizing Cool American Doritos, Cheerios, and Oreos as British food for the mere reason that they HAVE THESE PRODUCTS and I can order them. This is a major breakthrough for Switzerland and worth the CHF 15,90 delivery charge alone.

Also, they delivered the very next day, exactly when they said they would, between 5-8 pm, which was plenty of time for me to actually get dressed and look somewhat presentable, unlike the man from Die Post, who had the nerve to ring the bell at noon today when I was still in my circa 2001 plaid green pajama bottoms and bright blue and yellow Tweety slipper socks.

Anyway. Baby or not, I highly recommend shopping at leshop.ch. Not only will you avoid having any Migros moments, but the website is even in English.

Anyone else have experience grocery shopping online in Switzerland?