Hey y’all! Today I’m talking about one of my favorite memberships. I will admit, I am a complete SUCKER when it comes to memberships. I’ll sign up for one just about any chance I get. I have a gym membership, yet have barely used it in a year. I have a spray tan membership at LA Tan, but prefer the nicer “airbrush” tans at Glamour Girl Tan in Chicago, so I tend to go there instead. I have a membership at the Metropolitan Club for “business networking” in Chicago, but I travel all the time and never go. I have a blowout membership at DryBar… and I love it and use it every chance I get. Once in a blue moon, I’ll buy a membership that is totally worth my monthly dues. Drybar is one of those. Rent the Runway is definitely another.
I’m sure you all have heard of Rent the Runway, as it has become a very trendy place to rent designer dresses for weddings at our age. These days, we have weddings every other weekend it seems, so it just makes sense to rent a dress for the weekend instead of buying one you’ll probably never wear again. I have been a big fan of the idea of Rent the Runway for a while, but never tried it until I stumbled my way into their store in Chicago this past July.
I started looking around and signed up for an appointment with the stylist, who was very helpful. She gave me recommendations on designers and styles and then casually mentioned the unlimited membership option. I heard the word “unlimited,” and my eyes immediately lit up. Told you—complete sucker. But when she started explaining it to me, it just MADE SENSE.
So, here’s the deal, the unlimited membership is $159 a month, and you can rent 4 pieces at a time, as many times a month as you want. The rental price of the dress I had tried on that day was $150. So, yeah, what I’m telling you is that for just $9 more, I could get 3 more items that day and then return them next week and get 4 more, and then return them the next week and get 4 more, AND DO IT ALL AGAIN THE NEXT WEEK! And they take care of all the drycleaning and shipping and handling if you don’t live near a store. I was sold. Handed her my credit card right then and there and never looked back.
I’ve already been to 2 weddings and a rehearsal dinner with RTR pieces and have 3 more weddings this year that I will be using it for. Unfortunately, I didn’t take pictures at the first wedding or rehearsal dinner, but I promise to take pics in the upcoming weddings. Below are the dresses I wore to the wedding and rehearsal dinner, but forgot to photograph.
I also have been using the membership for vacations, girls weekends, a night on the town or just to the office and have been loving that more! They have soooo many cute things!
Rent the Runway is actually doing a very interesting campaign at the moment, saying that they expect to be the future of the closet. Since everything else these days is kept in the cloud, why shouldn’t your closet also be kept in the cloud? Just some food for thought. I already find that I’ve been buying a lot less and when I do purchase things, I’ve been trying to buy more staple pieces, like good jeans, nice boots/shoes, etc. and then using RTR to give my outfits a little tszuj*, like this staple top above! (*pronounced zhuj– if you’re like me and couldn’t figure out that word because you thought it was spelled jujj or jooj). One of my favorite items to rent from RTR are their jackets and coats! I love it because usually I only buy one staple winter coat and a couple fall or spring since coats are so expensive, but when you can RENT coats, your options are limitless. This coat I rented for my trip to Prague below would have been hundredddds of dollars to buy, but instead I rented it for the weekend and it barely cost me anything!
In addition to the unlimited membership, they also offer “RTR Update,” which is 4 monthly pieces for $89 a month. Read more about the membership types here. P.S. They also rent jewelry and handbags… just when you thought it couldn’t get any better! Hope y’all enjoy and let me know if you have any other questions!
