Women waste £7.3bn on unworn clothes

British women own £7.3 billion worth of clothes they do not wear, new research reveals.

Churchill Home Insurance finds that more than four women in five women (86 per cent) have bought clothes which have never been taken off the hanger.

In fact, the average British female has 14 items of clothing that have not see the light of day in the last year, with these items costing an average of £21.82.

Totting that up, it means there are £305 worth of clothes hanging unused in the average wardrobe.

And Churchill calculates that, over the course of a working lifetime, the average woman spends a whopping £12,810 on clothes they do not wear.

"The research clearly shows that many householders are guilty of buying new clothes in the sales which will never get worn. However, few are likely to realise how much money they are spending over the years in this way," said Martin Scott, head of Churchill Home Insurance.

And the amount people spend on unworn items is set to soar, with almost two women in three buying the majority of their unworn clothes in the sales.

Additionally, 63 per cent of people have bought clothes a size too small in the belief they will lose weight, with one woman in ten saying this has become a regular habit.

But men are not immune from buying and then not wearing clothes.

British males have an average of nine pieces of clothing each that they have not worn in the last year, with an average price tag of £18.68.

This adds up to a huge £7,901 worth of unwanted clothes over the average working life.