Oh no, Joules is one of my favourites.

My wardrobe is mainly Asda Sainsbury Matalan charity shops and occasionally Primark where I have bought tee shirts, always 100% cotton, some are 10 years old, and still look fine. I don’t throw anything out unless it’s in holes, when it’s turned into cleaning cloths for dh to use in the garage.
I will not miss Joules as I have never shopped there.

However earlier this year was in Cornwall, it was a tad chilly so ventured into Seasalt for shelter. It was the first time I had been in there, had no plans to buy anything but saw a dress, which to my surprise I bought, adding a nice matching scarf. Both in the sale, still over my usual budget, but it fitted and was the right length fir a shortie like me and had pockets. So I bought another last week, ditto to above., but sadly not in the sale.
Now I need a cardi to go with both as plan to wear over winter with boots but the one I saw in Seasalt was £80 ( for a cardi?!).

I try to avoid most of the usual chains and supermarkets. There are a whole range of online stores and charity catalogues that sell clothes, which, if not trading as ethical, are in fact doing so. Culture Vulture and the Amnesty catalogue are two.

Yes, they are more expensive than the chain stores, but the £80 sweater I bought this autumn is the only item of winter clothing I have bought, so overall, for one year's winter spend on clothing that is not much.

Like others I use charity shops, but find them somewhat random, if you ar looking for anything specific, and I usually am, they are not very useful.

I have bought second hand items on Etsy and ebay and have generally found them very good.

Fleurpepper

Oh I so agree. I remember the days when Leicester was full of quality clothing companies, including Corah that made all the clothes for M&S. The factory shop was a real help for us young mums.

But even if the clothes were made here (with much higher wage costs, social security contributions, etc,) - much of the materials have to be imported.

I remember not so long ago there was a news item about sweat shops in Leicester. Workers were being made to work during Covid lockdowns, I think.

I bought a lovely Joules yellow raincoat - wind and waterproof - recently. It was the most expensive jacket I've ever purchased but we were going on an Alaskan cruise and I was determined that the weather wouldn't stop me from getting the most out of it. As it was, we got sunburn on the cruise and I never got to wear my lovely jacket. Thank goodness for British weather! I'm finally getting my money's worth out of Joules. Lovely jacket with lots of fun detail. So disappointed that they may be going out of business.

I have succumbed (succame?) to a cardigan in the Black Friday sale.

Succame! Love it 🤭

Callistemon the conditions in the Leicester sweatshops meant that the city had to have really harsh lock down measures.
It had the highest rates of Covid at one time due to social distancing just not happening in the factories

I get mail order joules sometimes. I find it is good quality but the design and fit isn’t the best. They use very thick fabric which is a bit heavy for Australia . Having said that, you can’t go past their rain gear because it is actually waterproof unlike most of the stuff here!