Some time back, my doc recommended I wear compression socks because of swelling in feet and ankles. With a rating of 20-30.

With the necessary measurements I went to Lawtons pharmacy. I knew it would be expensive, but let's get it right for the first pair. I wasn't wrong but $95 came as a shock.

I looked on line and of the main brands the cheapest I could find were Jobst on a US site. I bought one pair for about $35US plus postage.

They were fine, you could tell where they'd saved money (the heel) and they were less stylish than the other pair - but who sees your socks? Main thing was they were good and did the job..

So I ordered another two pairs for what comes to about $90 Canadian. Still bloody expensive and I occasionally tried cheaper alternatives with no success, returning to two pairs of Jobst.

Of my most recent failures I had a pair that were just two tight - I felt I'd have to cut them off off - and another pair that felt right but the compression at the ankle was so inferior, my ankles swelled anyway.

I notice today that the Jobst socks are reduced to $30.95US (so two pairs would convert to $80 with postage/conversion) and astonishingly every website I find that sells them has the same price. Even ebay, would you believe. It seems some dodgy price fixing is going on.

The thing is, there ought to be somewhere that something equally good - guaranteed good - doesn't cost so much. It's clear to me that the ones I've tried that have just not been up to it are too cheap - albeit $15 is still a lot for a pair of flippin' socks. But I don't see any for about $25.

So, after all that, does anyone have any experience of graduated compression socks 20-30 rating - or any other rating where a cheap alternative has been as good as the more expensive Jobst, Sigvaris etc and what was it, where from?