Five Things to Buy After the Holidays for Great Discounts

With major retailers competing for your dollars during the Christmas shopping season, it's no wonder that the surplus of items will garner great discounts after the holiday season-and here's a list of five places to shop after the Holidays for great discounts!

After Holidays Discounts: Your local baking isle at the grocery store.

With so many "traditional" baked goods, homemade candies and desserts warming kitchens across the country, grocery stores and mass retailers like Target with a grocery section stock-up on baking essentials. After Holidays discounts are abundant as these merchants struggle to diminish their overstock of flour, chocolate chips and pumpkin pie spices-making it a perfect time to get a great discount and stock your pantry!

After Holidays Discounts: The seasonal wrapping and trimmings isle.

Never underestimate the value of purchasing wrapping paper, ribbon, and bows at 75% off for next year! If you have a place to store these holiday essentials-and many companies sell fantastic plastic containers especially designed for such goods-then head to your favorite retailer as early as the day after Christmas to scour the shelves for left-over trimmings. By New Year's Day, most stores will mark-up the discount over 50% to as high as 75%!

After Holidays Discounts: Auction sites, Craigslist.com, and local classifieds.

As anyone who has received an unwanted present-but no receipt for exchanging it-can tell you, that item is likely to sit unused and ignored unless someone offers to buy it. Sites like eBay and Craigslist offer huge discounts on merchandise, which happened to be gifted to the wrong recipient. Especially in the case of Craigslist, be sure to test your item before buying it-and if the discount sounds too good to be true, it probably is!

After Holidays Discounts: Seasonal Décor items.

Much like wrapping paper and ribbons, giant inflatable snow globes and twinkling lawn reindeer are heavily discounted at the end of the season, making it the perfect time to find after holidays discounts on Christmas lights, wreathes, decorative ribbon and more. This also extends to seasonal clothing items, such as festive sweaters, scarves and even jewelry. If you can't stomach a hunter green sweater with a giant red reindeer, consider buying it at 75% off and donating it to charity!

After Holidays Discounts: Gift card swapping, selling and bidding sites.

In the last few holiday seasons, Gift Card swapping websites have given the recipients of a Gift Card they will never use a whole new set of options. Sites such as GiftCardRescue.com allow you to view an offer for your unused, plastic Gift Cards; for example, a $25 JCPenny Gift Card was selling for $18.75 cash, or for a $19.68 Amazon.com Gift Card swap, as of publication of this guide. If you are certain you will never use that $50 at Forever 21, swap it for your favorite retailer and enjoy nearly-$50 in after holiday discounts at that store, instead. You can also buy Gift Cards on these sites, often as high as 30% off retail value.

Sources:
GiftCardRescue, "Discount Gift Cards up to 30%"