And the figures are set to rise dramatically over the next few weeks. Sixty-two percent of women admit they buy most of their unworn clothes in the sales. The New Year diet craze is also to blame for women who are looking to drop a dress size and find a bargain – 63 percent have bought clothes in a size too small in the past and one in ten admit to doing this regularly.

But it’s not just women who have hundreds of pounds of clothes going to waste in their closets – men are nearly as bad. On average, men have nine pieces of clothing that they haven’t worn in the last year, each with a price tag of £18.68. This adds up to a huge £7,901**** worth of unwanted clothes over the average working life.

Martin Scott, Head of Churchill Home Insurance said: “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.”

And when the unwanted clothes are finally removed from the wardrobe,

Online survey carried out for Churchill Home Insurance with 2,518 UK inhabitants, December 2005. UK population figures based on information supplied by the Office for National Statistics

* £7.3bn = Average cost of unwanted item (£21.82) x Number of items not worn in the last year (14) x Number of adult women in the UK (23,986,400)

** £305 = Average cost of unwanted item (£21.82) x Number of items not worn in the last year (14)

*** £12,810 = Cost of clothes not worn in the last year (£305) x 42 (average number of working years for a woman, based on 18-60 years)

**** £7,901 = Cost of clothes not worn in the last year (£168.12) x 47 (average number of working years for a man, based on 18-65 years)