Advanced options
The formula justifies good boots and convicts occasion dresses: a GBP 200 coat worn 100 times a winter beats a GBP 30 top worn twice. The honesty is all in the wears input: use how often you wear the SIMILAR thing you already own, not how often you intend to become someone who wears this. Under GBP 1/wear is wardrobe infrastructure: over GBP 20/wear is renting without the return date.
What The Cost Per Wear Calculator Works Out
- Cost per wear: price divided by lifetime wears, where lifetime wears is wears a month multiplied by 12 and by the years the item lasts. A GBP 200 winter coat worn five days a week for three seasons runs under 50p a wear; a GBP 30 going-out top worn twice costs GBP 15 a wear.
- The verdict: under GBP 1 a wear is wardrobe infrastructure, GBP 1 to GBP 5 is ordinary good clothing, GBP 5 to GBP 20 is a considered treat and over GBP 20 is occasion-wear territory. The integrity of the figure lives entirely in the wears estimate: project from how often the similar item you already own actually gets worn.
- The comparison that matters: durability is where cheap and dear diverge. Stitching, fabric weight and repairability decide whether the lifetime is 30 wears or 300.
- Care and repairs (advanced): dry cleaning, re-heeling and alterations per year, added to the lifetime cost. Cobbler-and-tailor maintenance extends the good item's life for pounds a year.
- Resale value (advanced): what the item fetches on a resale platform when you are done with it, deducted from the lifetime cost. A resale residual can push the effective cost per wear towards zero.
- Lifetime cost of owning it (advanced): price plus care minus resale, the true denominator-ready figure.
- Cheap alternative (advanced): the price and lifespan of the fast-fashion version worn at the same rate, giving its own cost per wear and the number of replacements needed to cover the same years. Fast fashion's price advantage evaporates when wears are counted rather than purchases.
- Wears before buying beats renting (advanced): the lifetime cost divided by the rental price per wear. If you expect fewer wears than that, the rental platforms exist for exactly this category.