Girls just wanna be frugal

TRENDY AND THRIFTY | Web site helps young women with 'high tastes and low budgets' make the most of both

BY CHERYL V. JACKSON for the Chicago Sun-Times’

Noelle Provencial and her friends were commiserating over their expensive tastes and limited funds.

They wanted to spend more time and dollars at Club Monaco and other stores, but their budgets just wouldn't allow, she said.

They knew other fashion-forward types were in the same predicament: They want pricey pedis and Louboutins and to be seen sporting them in fabulous places.

"We all talked about how we didn't have enough money to afford the fashions we wanted," Provencial said. "None of us had the tools to have that life."

So they went to work to provide that tool, launching PoorLittleRichGirls.com earlier this month. The Web site helps hip young women find places to score $3 cocktails, $20 blowouts and other moderately priced must-haves. It's the newest Chicago-based beauty/ party Web site targeting women who want the latest in products and places for the fabulous.

Beauty On Call founder Stacey Koerney-Roney launched Glossed & Found, an online magazine, last month.

Carolyn Brundage has expanded Pretty City.com, her spa review Web site, from 30 cities to 45 cities in the last year. The site gets 7.5 million visits a year, with businesses leaning on such avenues to increase business in a sagging economy.

"People are stretching their services. Instead of hair-coloring every four weeks, they're doing it every six weeks," Brundage said. Her Web site's users have a median age of 31 and an annual median income of about $78,500 and reportedly spend about $2,900 a year on grooming services.

PoorLittleRichGirls.com aims for a different demographic: trendy, thrifty, fabulous and frugal 18- to 30-year-olds "with high tastes and low budgets," Provencial said. Along along with partners Lacey Brenly and Eryn Barba, she spent about $2,000 on the site, which promises scoops on places to party and ideas for home decorating on the cheap. They brought in other girlfriends to do public relations and handle graphic design to help attract salons, boutiques and stores that offer discounts to Web site visitors. Most items and services on the site will cost between $20 and $150.

There's plenty of fun to be had for a few bucks, Brenly said at the site's launch party at Moxie, which offered $5 martinis and $3 you-call-its for the night.

"This is the kind of bar we'd send our girls to," she said. "It's more affordable than the other bars in Wrigleyville."