Lifestyle 2 min read 3h ago · Updated August 25, 2026 at 02:35 UTC

John Lewis Uni List Raises Eyebrows

John Lewis's official university packing checklist recommends students bring 30 to 40 clothes hangers, describing velvet hangers as 'standard' items.
The same checklist includes an £80 spice rack among its suggested university essentials, raising questions about the list's relevance to typical student budgets.
The guidance has drawn scrutiny as a broader indicator of the gap between retail-defined 'essentials' and the practical financial realities facing incoming students.

John Lewis has published a packing checklist for incoming university students that recommends bringing between 30 and 40 clothes hangers — described as consisting "mostly of standard velvet or plastic hangers" — a piece of guidance that has prompted raised eyebrows over what, precisely, counts as standard.

The checklist in question

The retailer's officially published guide, aimed at students preparing for their first term, sets out a range of items it deems essential for university life. Among them, alongside the contentious hanger recommendation, is an £80 spice rack — a purchase that sits uneasily with the financial pressures many students face as they weigh up the broader cost of a degree.

The suggestion that velvet hangers — a product more commonly associated with aspirational home organisation than the average student hall — qualify as a routine or unremarkable purchase reflects a broader question about the retail industry's framing of what freshers genuinely need.

Ad Unit · 728×90 / Responsive

A shifting picture of student life

Whether students require four dozen hangers to navigate their first year is, of course, open to debate. What is less debatable is that the cost of equipping a university room, when guided by lists such as this one, can escalate well beyond the basics. For students already navigating significant financial decisions about higher education, the gap between what a retailer recommends and what is strictly necessary may feel considerable.

For those seeking more grounded guidance on what university life actually demands, peer accounts of what students wish they had known before starting university offer a markedly different perspective to the retail version. The John Lewis checklist, whatever its intentions, appears to reflect an image of student life that many freshers may find difficult to recognise.

##JohnLewis ##UniversityLife ##Freshers

Ad Unit · 300×250 / Responsive