Local Resident Creates Bargain Shopping Website

When Suzanne O’Connor was a teen she would rebel against her mom, L.A.’s original Bargain Lady, Geri Cook, by going shopping at Saks Fifth Avenue and charging something. Now, years later with a daughter of her own, she is a “bargainologist” who hopes her daughter won’t find her way to Saks Fifth Avenue with her credit card.

“My mom is the one who taught me value,” O’Connor said. “She taught me how to look for quality at a really great price and how to find those hidden places.”

This La Crescenta resident spends about six hours a day researching bargains, posting sales, talking to stores, working on her message board and writing articles for her online newsletter that she does for www.BargainsLa.com (a website that she created with her husband.) A former professional dancer for 25 years, O’Connor was looking for a career change since she was about to become a mother for the first time.

In 1995, as O’Connor complained to her mother while looking into the eyes of her young newborn daughter about how hard it was going to be to work and be a mom, her mother suggested that she join the family business.

“I was teaching at four different colleges,” O’Connor said. “I couldn’t take out of town work, so it seemed like a logical step to go work for my mom.”

The move was slow and gradual as she started out by doing research and assisting with the newsletter that her mom put out.

Still moving at a snail speed, O’Connor and her husband, Kevin, were still working full-time when Kevin suggested at a Thanksgiving dinner that they start a website.

“As the site began to demand more of my time,” O’Connor said. “I started cutting back on my teaching hours.”

Just when this entrepreneur thought she was over the hump, 9/11 happened and retail went down and she found herself devastated as she sat in front of her television set wondering was this the right time to take this leap into another career.

“Instead of being really unhappy and thinking that the world was coming to an end, I started writing down names of anchors and news producers and I sent them press releases,” she said.

Not long after the press releases went out, O’Connor got her first call from Fox 11. This led to her appearing on the Fox 11 early morning news, then the NBC evening news.

“After I appeared on Fox news and the NBC news,” she said, “the website just flew.”

Suzanne’s other half is not surprised by his wife accomplishments.

“The news often calls her in to be an expert bargain shopper,” Kevin said.

“She does a two to three minute spill about where you can get the best deals.”

This “bargainologist” has grown up around finding the best deals, so she can’t help but know how to find a bargain.

“You can get deals on just about anything except a Louis Vuitton handbag,” she said. “But you have to take the time to look for it.”

This antique lover who now stays clear of antique stores has launched the www.BargainsLa.com Shoppers Club.

The card allows its members an additional savings of eight to 33 percent at select bargain stores.

The membership card is $24 a year.

“The price of gas has gone up,” O’Connor said. “I wanted to give a person from Orange County an incentive to drive to a place like Marz in Montrose.”

This La Crescenta resident of four years website motto is — Quality Goods and Service at Below Retail Pricing.

“Time is money,” O’Connor said. “So take the time to shop and get a good deal.”

It’s a combination of mystery shopping mixed with investigative reporting along with O’Connor’s mission to get the best deal for the clients that visit her website.

“Every store on our website, I have been in the store personally,” O’Connor said. “If I serve the public interests first then it’s a chain reaction as everybody loves a great deal.”

Kevin and Suzanne tag team by taking turns with the daily up keep of the website, finding bargains and caring for their 10-year-old daughter.

“We moved to this area because of our daughter,” Kevin and Suzanne said at the same time. “We wanted to be in a neighborhood that had a good school district.”

Though it has been some time since she has been on a wild shopping spree — it doesn’t stop O’Connor from having the inclination to take that Saks Fifth Avenue plunge again.

She looks at the man she met 19 years ago when he was a disc jockey and she was a dancer.

“I love Saks Fifth Avenue,” she said. “But I agree with my mom that type of shopping is easy because when you sit down and look at how much money you waste, it’s a sobering experience.”