When I was growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area my parents didn't believe in credit cards. My mother didn't drive and we walked to the grocery store all the time. Those were the days before the first big shopping malls existed. On the way to the grocery store we would pass several childrens and womens clothing stores. These were small boutiques because the big name clothing stores were not around yet - no shopping malls remember. My mother would have a very small budget but she always managed to have good quality clothes on our backs. She did all of this with the fine art of lay-away. It was very common for each store to have it's own lay-away policy and often it was the only way for many families to afford the necessary items other than food and shelter.

It was a shame when most stores abandoned the lay-away concept in favor of credit cards. With lay-away there was no finance charge or credit checks. The only store that I know of that kept the lay-away plan is Kmart. With the Kmart Lay-Away plan you can lay-away almost any of Kmart's merchandise except perishables and flammable items. There are only 2 other items you can't put on lay-away at Kmart and they are cell phones and computers.

For people on a budget Kmart has several different brands of sewing machines. Since they are the part of the Sears family they have Singer, Kenmore and others.


With the lay-away plan it might look more affordable to those on a tighter budget since financing credit cards is so expensive.