SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (WWLP) – Every year, parents pay more for back-to-school necessities. A national retailers group predicts parents will spend an average this year of just under $700, up more than $70 from last year.

On Monday, mother of three Mandy Velozo of Ware bought her son the sneakers he will need in Middle school. She has a plan to stay within her budget. “I spend a little each week. Maybe take a hundred each week. Just go and take one kid and then get them what they need,” Velozo said. Her son, Ryan, claims that peer pressure often dictates the kind of clothes he has to buy. “Some kids will pick on you at school If you don’t have the right stuff,” he said.

Back when in his grandmother, Lynn Smith, was raising her kids, she said children weren’t out to make a fashion statement. “We’d get a couple of pairs of pants, a couple of shirts and a pair of shoes,” Smith said. Some kids seem to be happy to get whatever their folks can afford to give them. “It doesn’t bother me if I don’t have the top notch or anything,” said Francis Venne, a fifth grader at Converse Middle School in Palmer.

Kelly Cavallini’s children are now in college. Over the years, the Springfield resident has learned what she calls an invaluable lesson: this is not the time to start back-to-school shopping. “Wait, wait, buy it after school starts. We don’t end up buying things we don’t need,” Cavallini said. But for many, now is the time to start their back-to-school shopping. Smith said that she recalls spending $100 per year, instead of today’s average cost of $689 per family.