Upon being paid a compliment on an item of clothing, do you immediately bleat out where you got it and how much it cost?

At posh dinner parties, does your husband put his head in his hands when you stand up, spin around with your arms out, and proclaim imperiously “Designer bargain. £29.99. TK Maxx”?

Does your local shop keeper, office security guard, pizza delivery guy, bus driver, nurse and plasterer know the price, designer name and store of origin of every one of your outfits?

If so, then you have Compulsive Price Disclosure, or CPD. Often referred to by industry professionals as “Clobber Gob”, CPD is a widespread epidemic in the UK with up to 80% of women admitting to this behaviour.

It is defined as an obsessive need to tell everyone how much you paid for clothes, how much they were reduced by, and how much you would have paid – had you paid full price.

TK Maxx has conducted extensive research on this fascinating disorder and found that 1 in 5 women have responded to a clothing compliment by compulsively disclosing the price in the past week alone. That’s the equivalent of 4.6 million cases of CPD a week or 239 million cases every year. Stunning.

Anthropologists think CPD’s roots are embedded in our “hunter-gatherer” DNA. “If a Neanderthal female returned with just five armfuls of berries when she could get 10 for the same effort elsewhere she would be ejected from the community and would most likely be devoured by a T.Rex, or worse. It’s just that now we are bargain-hunter-gatherers,” posited one expert. (Editor’s Note: we think this theory is rubbish).

However, it was Anjula Mutanda who offered us the greatest clarity. “CPD emphasises a person’s desire to be seen as a savvy shopper who can hunt out quality bargains. This is very much a reflection of our times - where we see growing concern about the potentially difficult financial times that lie ahead.”

In short: being a bargain hunter is cool.

Anjula Mutanda
B.A (Hons), M.A (ed). Cert CISD, MBACP (Accred) UKRC Regd, Senior Practitioner.

Anjula Mutanda is a consultant psychology and mental health expert and life coach, with over 15 years experience in a diversity of settings - from Kent University working with students experiencing a wide range of psychological and emotional challenges, to the cut and thrust of the City as a Stress Management Consultant, Careers Counsellor and Outpatient Specialist. Anjula is also trained in managing critical incident and post-trauma cases, and has worked with a wide range of clients from victims of crime, to victims of major accidents. Her expertise has led to her appearance on a variety of television programmes including Big brother, GMTV and ITV1's This Morning.

The search for a cure has not yet begun because the debate is still raging as to whether CPD is actually a problem. According to our research, bashful British women find the behaviour is actually useful in diverting attention away from them when receiving a compliment. CPD is also a free form of PR for TK Maxx since we are the home of the utterly brag-able bargain!