Where'd you get your costume? Shopping for costumes online

by Kalila

Once upon a time, dancers in the U.S. had few choices regarding costumes. For the most part, they had to make everything themselves. Later, there were a few vendors, but they were hard to find. You might see them at special events and stock up when you did see them. The advent of the Web has made it much easier to purchase costumes, but it takes a little bit of detective work to find what you're looking for at the best price.

Let's face it. Bellydance vendors are small companies. Some have one owner who does the buying or creates the products, advertises, vends, manages the payments, packages orders and ships them, and balances the books. Whew. That's a lot for a single person to undertake and a lot of knowledge for one person to have. Obviously some vendors are bigger, but I have yet to run across a vendor with more than about 10 employees.

Because small companies don't have enough employees or resources to specialize, they are rarely internet-savvy. They don't build their sites in the best way for search engines to find their products. (Yes. There are a lot of tricks here; some are ethical, others are not.) Frequently their sites are poorly built, hard to read, and hard to navigate. They often don't have convenient ways to pay on-line. In short, they don't have e-commerce quite down. But they have cool stuff, some at more reasonable prices than others. And it's up to you to find it.

Finding costumes

Beyond a friend's advice, there are two excellent resources for finding vendors on the internet: search engines (e.g., Yahoo and Google), and link resources on reputable sites. But the internet is huge. How do you sift through all of the sand to find that one golden nugget? Sometimes you get lucky and find the perfect costume on the first try. However most of the time, it takes research and going through lots of web pages in order to find the right site. There are a few tricks to make the sifting more efficient. Let's look at some of those tricks to make your search filter a bit better. We'll also look a bit at tricks used by vendors to help you filter out yet another layer.

Search engines

With any search, it helps to know what you're looking for, whether in your local library's card catalog, in the dictionary, or on the internet. Go to your favorite search engine and try searching for "bellydance costume". You will get a bunch of vendors in the list. But are you looking for a designer cabaret bra and skirt costume, or an entry-level tribal outfit? With a search that broad, you're also likely to find people who just describe their costumes on their sites. Because you didn't give any details, the search engine will return any page that it finds with the two words ("bellydance" and "costume") contained on the page. Try again with "blue harem pants". You'll get a whole new set of results, and most of them are vendors. The more detail that you can give, the more likely you are to find what you're looking for without having to page through thousands of options.

Try a couple of searches and see what you get. If you get too many results, how do you choose between the vendor listed on the first page, and the one listed on the 33rd? Generally speaking, the one on the first page is your best bet. It got on the first page based on the number of hits and the number of links to the store. Theoretically, people are linking to a store that they've shopped at and like, not one where they've had horrible experiences. If that first page vendor has what you want, go ahead and try it. On the other hand, if your search yields no results, check your spelling, and/or try being less specific. Remember the details like some people prefer the spelling "bellydance", while others prefer "belly dance".

The results pages can also be a little confusing because there are usually two columns of results. Which one should you pick? Let's look at how the vendors got there. As I already mentioned, the main results list is in order of site popularity according to the search engine's definition of popular. This is the left-hand column. The column on the right that contains "sponsored links" or "sponsor results". These companies paid the search engine to display their information when you search for specific words. The company paying the most money appears at the top. Are these companies that you want to use? Possibly. You will need to be the judge. Sometimes the words that the company has paid for don't quite fit their product offerings. On the other hand, sometimes they do a very good job of filtering for you because the company has selected good words to trigger their ads. I've had perfectly pleasant transactions dealing with some of these companies in the past. It's up to you, but do include a degree of skepticism when clicking on those sponsors.

Reputable sites

Another great resource is the links or resources page on a bellydance site that you know and trust. On this site, for example, I have a links page where I list a number of costume resources that I have used and like. Not every transaction goes perfectly with these vendors (see the earlier description of small businesses), but I have generally gotten good quality merchandise at a reasonable price. More importantly, I have never had a bad experience with any of these vendors. And most people who list vendors on their sites are in a similar situation. They will encourage others to shop at their favorites by listing favorites on their sites.

How do you find other reputable sites? Most studios have their own websites. Your teacher may just have a resource list if she has a site. There are also more general bellydance sites and webs of links. One excellent resource is shira.net. From Shira's site, you can find many links to other teachers' sites, where they have links to vendors.

eBay

eBay is another great resource for costume pieces. Again, though, searching is the key. There are a lot of small vendors who sell almost exclusively on eBay for direct internet sales. Examples include Melodia Designs (tribal pants) and A'Kai Silks (veils). Searching, again, is the key to finding what you want. There are a few tricks, as well. In particular, be aware of the difference between auction items and items in eBay Stores. When you conduct a search, the auction items appear by default, but there's a link at the bottom of the page to view results from the stores. Many vendors sell exclusively through the stores, so you're missing a lot of items to skip these. Here are some examples of useful eBay keywords:

Almost every non-bra top is listed as a "choli".
"Tribal" is also a very useful word for everything from jewelry to bras, belts, and other items.
A whole lot of items will turn up when you search for "costume", but be prepared to wade through a lot of junk. One vendor lists every hip belt with the word costume. Yuck.
Sparkly jewelry (for those who like it) can be found under "bridal". Skip any dance references, though.
A search for "bra belt" (with a space) will find bedlah sets.
Just as in searching the web, remember that some prefer "bellydance", while others prefer "belly dance". Savvy vendors will list both.

Standard search items also apply. For example, use as many terms as you can to narrow down your search, but check spellings or take off some words if you don't get any results.

I found what I want. Now what?

When you find the perfect costume, it's hard to not just grab it, but there are a few things to consider for your own and the vendor's protection.

Getting the right size

Make sure the item will fit you. Know your measurements before you order or bid. In fact, because many vendors post measurements with the items, it helps to know before you even start looking. Aren't sure what to measure? Most vendor sites have a fairly good description of which measurements they require. Audrena.com has a great illustration. Get a friend to help with your measurements. Keep a list, and re-measure if you have a weight gain or loss of more than 10 lbs.

Protecting yourself

There are several things that you can do to protect yourself when paying online. Some are as simple as checking the URL. Make sure that the URL on the page where you enter your payment information starts "https". Note the "s" at the end. This means that the URL is secure, and means that no one else can see the information that you're transmitting. Also, never e-mail your credit card number. E-mail is never secure. To protect information entered on your computer, install anti-spyware software. This is in addition to your anti-virus software. (If you need some, search for "spyware" on your favorite search engine.) Most spyware is harmless and just offers tracking for sites you may commonly shop at. Some spyware is predatory, records all information that you type in on websites, and sends it back to a database, effectively stealing personal information.

For a payment method selection, always pay by credit card with a new vendor. The reason? This gives you the most protection. With credit cards, you have a great deal of protection on internet transactions. If you see a fraudulent charge on your card, just call your credit card company. They get you a new card with a new number and take the transaction off your bill. If you have a major service issue, try to resolve it with the vendor first. But you can also call your credit card company for help.

If you can manage to pay with a credit card through PayPal, all the better. PayPal offers you an additional level of protection. If you have an issue, start with the vendor. Go to PayPal if you can't get the issue resolved to your satisfaction. If that also fails, you can still go to your credit card company.

Should you choose to sell a used costume on eBay, there are additional things that you should to protect yourself. But that's a topic for another article.