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Girl Android		 The Bridal Store Experience... [ March 03, 2003 ]

As probably everyone but a substantial portion of my relatives knows, Decay and I are getting married. Actually getting through to the bit where we say I do is proving a little difficult in the negotiation terms with various parties involved. If we had our say on what happens, we'd be married a month and a day from today... none of this wedding crap! However, we do know that we'd get lynched if the parentals didn't get a wedding, so we're attempting to get the ball rolling for that aspect of the marriage thing, with varying degrees of success.

Anyway ... the whole wedding thing means looking for a wedding dress to wear for the wedding thing ... so, in the middle of January I made a trip with DK the elder to Brides of the Glen, to see what was out there in the land of non-white, non meringuey dresses ... and then last Saturday, I made a trip with G to four places, in an overload of bridal fluffery ...

So ... what happened?


January 17 2003

Brides of the Glen

DK the Elder and I arrived fashionably late (?!) to this appointment after work, cos she was running a little late with having to deal with a customer on the phones ... that, and it was a stinking hot day too ... we arrived, and were led through the smallish collection of dresses available to try ... not much really caught my eye ... but I tried a few of the less beady dresses on, just to see what the colour and the shape looked like on me ... we did establish that evening that white was definitely not going to be the colour I was wearing for the whole dress... if we were going with white, we were going ivory or champagne, or anything but stark hospital-grade white ... Droidy looks a bit jumpy with stark white ... the lady who served us here was very polite and mostly helpful though ... she suggested some interesting things, but tended toward the more beady/embroidery things (they did happen to be the more expensive ones) ... but was happy to help me find something I wouldn't mind trying on ... if something had actually caught my eye there, I'd be willing to go back there.

1 March 2003

This whole day was pretty much organised via email while sitting in the receptionist chair at work ... it was originally going to be on 22 February, but I found that booking a week ahead wasn't far ahead enough, and I couldn't get appointment times at all ... so we moved it to the week after, which meant that DK the Elder wouldn't be able to make it ... that's ok, I enlisted the help of G a little while earlier, because she wanted to come along for the experience of seeing me in a fluffy meringue of a dress!

Anyway, we organised for me to retrieve G from her place at about 8:30am, and head over to the first appointment, with some sort of breakfast-type meal to follow, before the other appointments...

9:00am - Kris K Bridal

This was one place I wanted to go to because of the dresses I saw in the only other bridal magazine I've ever bought ... just generally there seemed to be dresses that were more to my taste than the usual much beaded and embroidered stuff... I tried on a few dresses, one in gold, and various others including one that was a bit 1950's, according to G ... we also had a bit of a chat about designing something to suit what I wanted, and came to the conclusion that the sourcing of the fabric would be the issue with making the dress ... Generally the service was good, but a little harried, as there were three appointments at once ... the lady who was serving me was at least thinking on the same wavelength as me in terms of shape and style of dress ... maybe not so much available (ie none) in the wrinkly crinkly fabric department, but at least she wasn't leading me into trying a pile of horrid beaded embroidered monstrosities ... I left the place thinking if I didn't find anything else in the rest of today I'd be happy coming back here to find something to suit...

11:00am - Melissa Morrison Dressmaking Studio

We stopped off at the local McD's for some breakfasty sustenance ... Hash browns and coffee for me, toasted tomato and cheese sandwiches and tea and english muffin for G ... we needed to kill a little time, so we went across the road to one of G's favourite stores, Millhouse. If I'd known about this place while I was still at school, this is where I would've thrown all my money at ... beautiful (do we call this bohemian? hippie? ) clothes at fairly ok prices, and lots of other stuff to look at besides... I saw a skirt that would've gone very well with a spiderwebby lace top that DK's parentals gave to me for my birthday/christmas, and decided that after our appointment with Melissa Morrison, we'd go back and I'd have a look at the price ... went back and the skirt was gone! Nevermind ... left a name and contact number for when they next got their stock in ... it's ok, G's a regular there, she'll keep an eye out!

Even after our trip to Millhouse, we arrived about 10 minutes early for our appointment ... was a bit daunted by the whole designer type thing - I wasn't originally looking to get a dress designed from scratch, and was rather worried at how much this was going to set me back ... sat down and tried to describe what I was looking for in a dress ... went back to the car to grab the rather bookmarked copy of the only bridal magazine I currently own (I'd given my collection of bridal magazines to Wendy when she announced her engagement) ... Melissa was very easy to talk to, we gasbagged for over an hour here about pretty much everything ... she wasn't daunted when we mentioned a certain item of footwear in the same sentence as a wedding dress... or when we mentioned the intricacies of how G knows DK and Shane ... anyways... she came up with an initial quote ... and I have to say ... I'm surprised! In my scale of things to do with how much they should be worth, I'd be willing to pay up to a certain amount if it is the perfect thing ... having it designed from scratch does give a lot more assurance that it will be exactly what I want, and what she was asking for, was at about the limit of what I was willing to pay for the perfect dress ... it was certainly more affordable than some of the not quites I'd already tried on ... I left this place thinking I really wouldn't mind coming back here and having a dress designed the way I want it ...

2:30pm - House of Moshe

G and I decided we'd have lunch in Armadale, before this appointment because we had a fair amount of time to kill... we parked, and then it started raining lots ... so we sat in the car til the rain decided it might hold up for a little while, and we walked up and down High Street to get our geographical bearings in order ... Lunch was good - nachos with non-bottley salsa full of real tomatoes, and wedges with sour cream and sweet chilli sauce - we are soooo healthy, but why improve on the McD's breakfast standard? ... G paid before I even realised ... oops (: Thanks for lunch - I owe you one!

We wandered into House of Moshe a little early, and perused the dresses on offer ... they were a little aloof with us at first, but once they realised we actually had an appointment, they were very courteous and helpful ... they were running late today though, so we sat around on their sofas perusing magazines and discussing bridal table issues while they were apologising for running late ...

Once they got to us, we had a small discussion about what I was looking for, and what had caught my eye in the racks ... our consultant suggested some interesting options though, and I tried on about 5 dresses ... one with crinkly fabric! and one in the colour I've been looking for! The thing is though, she was happy to suggest ways to create the exact dress I was after, even suggesting fabrics, and how to achieve crinkly fabric and silvery blue in the one dress... this discussion was one of the more valuable bits of information we had from this place, besides finding out that this shade of blue actually exists in fabric...

4:00pm - Brides of Armadale

After the running-late-ness at House of Moshe, we were only 10 minutes early for our appointment with Brides of Armadale ... we walked in ... and the first thing we were handed was a pair of white gloves to handle the dresses ... by a lady who was surprised to hear that I actually did have an appointment to have a look at some dresses ... a Chinese lady was busy wrapping up a sale to a honky lass and her family, so she was being all charming and polite and stuff while discussing payment options in Cantonese, and there was someone who came in hoping to book an appointment, or take our appointment if we didn't show up ... in hindsight, I think we should've left ...

Anyway ... we picked out three dresses to try ... each more meringuey than the next... I actually picked these ones because they each had something interesting about them ... the first had wire butterflies sewn on with some subtle embroidery that actually looked ok ... the second was a meringue full stop, and the third was an interesting shade of blue ... we went to the change room with my selections, and I attempted to make some small talk with unsmiling lady ... but this was about as difficult as something that is really quite difficult except that it's even harder because you're trying to do it backwards and blindfolded.

However, the bitchiness was only just warming up ... I tried on the first one ... stepped out, and looked... it looked ok, but a little wide for my tastes, but it still wasn't a true meringue ... The other lady (Armadale witch?) just blurted out ... try on the next one, after I was asked to rate it out of 10 ... and gave it about 7.5, which is ok, not ugly but not the one in my scale of things ...

So, after that kind of prompting, I tried on the next one. Whoa ... meringue! This was mostly an exercise in trying on things just in case my preconceived views were wrong in telling me that a meringue wasn't going to suit me. I didn't look anywhere near as lost as I thought I was going to be ... even G was surprised. I commented on this, and the Armadale witch blurted out, 'Why are you even trying on this style if you're not after something this big!?' ... I was just in shock that she'd even say that out loud ... I wasn't even sure how to react, so I just made some comment about how I just wanted to see if I was wrong in thinking I'd be lost in a big dress... and that I'd learnt something today about how not all big dresses are going to make me look lost ...

Nevermind... I tried on the third dress, and whoa... how big was this one!? It probably didn't help that they didn't select the right petticoat for the dress at all, but I really did feel lost in this one ... the blue of the dress was completely washed out in the lights they had set up in front of the mirror, and so I just gave up on this one, and changed back into my clothes ... I swear, they had us out in about 10 minutes ...

I wasn't happy at all with the attitude they gave me the whole time ... I know I look young ... and to be honest... I was actually expecting this sort of treatment at more places I visited, and was very surprised that I was actually treated nicely everywhere ... even if I did find the perfect dress here, I wouldn't give them my business at all, purely because they treated me like rubbish. I don't expect people to be fawning all over me just because I walked into their store, but I do expect a minimum level of politeness, and I didn't get it here at all ... That kind of outright bitchiness just isn't called for, and it makes me happy to recommend that people just don't go there at all ... if they're going to be so shallow about appearances, I'll leave them to exercise their bitchiness on someone else. The thing is, even though we were handed gloves to handle the dresses, these dresses were the grimiest dresses of all the places we went to that day ... make-up stains everywhere and beading and embroidery fraying ...

Yes... so that's been my experience with the bridal gown industry. I'm not visiting any more places, and I am sure as hell not going back to or recommending anyone go to the last place I went to ... I've actually calmed down a lot since Saturday afternoon ... I didn't want to rant while I was still quite annoyed with them ... it's kind of soured the rest of the really nice experiences I've had with everywhere else I've visited ... I'm to the point where I nearly want to write thankyou letters to everyone and *accidentally* send the wrong one to Brides of Armadale... I'm not that bitter... yet!

We've already figured out who the photographer, florist, cake-maker, and reception venue are likely to be, so all we have to do now is pick a date, figure out this guest list and book the damn things! I'm all for just running off and coming back married you know ...

Update 6.10.03
I know, it's been a while, but there's been a sudden flurry of activity, unseen since The Matrix: Reloaded post ... there's 5 days until I get to see what this 'excuse to dress up for a day'-dress will look like ... Courtesy of Melissa Morrison Designs ... what won me over? No flinching when those shoes were mentioned (: Course, she knows that now (: And I should've been looking to get the thing made anyway - saves me time looking for the impossible! (:
Comments

man, i wish i was there to tell that lady off...they cant be rude if they want your business...
wish i could have seen you in wedding dresses!
time is flying....

Posted by: b on March 14, 2003 11:21 AM

I totally understand how you felt and agree that the women at Brides of Armadale were bitches. I was there myself last Saturday and found my wedding dress after many Saturday's of hunting around for the one that would suit me. I was considering buying it but seeing as the service was not great I am going else where to get it copied. Good luck with your wedding preparations!

Posted by: Tam on September 2, 2003 09:36 PM

I actually went to the Brides of Armadale, and it was pretty good.. The service was friendly and they were pretty helpful. It's true that they have not much to say but whatever i asked for i had a quick and specific response that was good enough. As for you calling one of the ladies the Armadale witch, I think your comment was biased and uncalled for. As for me, I had a pretty successful wedding, and i have no complains at all, and if anyone needed their wedding done i would refer them to the Brides of Armadale. Hope you have a good wedding.. It's a wonderful thing which you will remember for the rest of your life.

Posted by: Carrey on October 1, 2003 03:50 PM

it's not that they had not much to say... it's that they had too much to say, and no time for someone they had already formed pre-conceived ideas about. I was the ONLY person in the store at the time of my appointment.

Further to the point, I was quite polite to them in the store... I'm willing to give people second chances, such as at House of Moshe where they were ready to be a bit brief, until they realised we had an appointment... I just don't think catty comments about why I picked out something were called for.

It's ok, I'm over it now, I gave up looking and found someone to make exactly what I was looking for (: 59 Days to Go...

Posted by: [0-0] on October 2, 2003 08:56 AM

[quote]I think your comment was biased and uncalled for[/quote]

Biased? Of course it was biased..... people do not make objective derogatory comments. They are subjective....

As for being uncalled for, this is once again a subjective comment..... droidy was treated badly and decided to give them a blast.... at the time we were #1 for a hit on google for BoA.... We are now #4.... so all those prospective marshmallow dress wearing brides to be, who are web savvy, will be warned of a bad experience (or two) it seems....

Posted by: Decay on October 2, 2003 10:22 AM

To the lady who wrote the artical about Brides of Armadale, I have only one thing to say.
I got married a couple of months ago now and bought my gown from Brides of Armadale and I couldn't have been happier.
I think that you might be telling a little lie when you said, that the gowns where the dirtest you have seen as I think they are the cleanest gowns I have seen, purely because they use gloves which I think a lot of other stores should use.
Some that I tried on made me sick as to how dirty they were.

The staff there couldn't be more helpful if they tried. I was very happy with the gown, service and there was nothing that I could have fault them on.

So maybe my dear it was you rather then them. After all you didn't have to tell us about breakfast, lunch and afternoon tea we didn't care what you had. So stick to the point.

A friend of mine is also getting her gown from there as well and she couldn't be happier.

Happy Married Life Dear.

Posted by: Monica Griffiths on October 3, 2003 06:26 PM

Don't forget everybody there are two sides to every story and Brides of Armadale have been very professional in not commenting but maybe they should.

Posted by: Maria on October 3, 2003 06:48 PM

Oh please, haven't we all had bad service from time to time, I am in the service industry and I can tell you that probably you would have been one of several that day that probably wanted to try this and try that and never buy anything and the poor woman probably had had enough.

Grow up woman, ok you didn't buy the dress from there, you went else where,but that your choice. Besides who do you think you are Princess Diana. She was the only one that got top service.

Haven't you ever had the off day or are you a little saint.

Posted by: LS on October 4, 2003 06:58 PM

I just wish I had the kind of experience some people who have been commenting have had at the store... all I have to say is of my own experience, which, for the most part was quite pleasant at the rest of the places I visited (:

I was so surprised to meet with such offputting reactions, especially after the phonecall to make the appointment - they just sounded so nice on the phone ... I do hope that it was just a bad day on their part though.

Might I remind people that this is a forum for discussion available for viewing by the public. The majority of the contributors to this site know each other in REAL LIFE, as do the majority of the commenters to the posts. I posted this review with the full knowledge that someone from, or associated with, the Brides of Armadale may well stumble upon the article, and I hope that in having read my _opinion_ on my experience there, have found themselves some customer feedback from someone who didn't end up buying a dress from them.

Having worked on the phones in a service-oriented business, I can say that the majority of the direct feedback we get is positive - we don't get to hear so much about the ones who got away.

I can't deny that people have had/will have good experiences in dealing with the consultants at BofArm, just as people shouldn't be discounting my very valid experience. I just hope that it's more of the good and less of the not so good.

Posted by: [0-0] on October 6, 2003 12:46 PM

ok... I'm in the mood for a fight.....

Monica Griffiths (Don't you love people including their full name on the Internet?)
What would droidy have to gain from telling a lie about Brides of Armadale? You outright accuse some one of lying because of your experience. You had great service? that is great. Droidy, however did not. a quote "After all you didn't have to tell us about breakfast, lunch and afternoon tea", she didn't have to tell you about anything, you didn't have to read it........ read the URL, rantspace.org.... the ability to rant on about anything..... so take your condescending attitude, my dear and move to somewhere more sedate.

Maria, as to Brides of Armadale not commenting... who says they haven't?

LS... yes we have all had bad service once in a while..... We all know the reasons why..... but if you have bad customer service do you bitch to your friends? Make recommendations to not go to that venue/shop? Well rantspace is a chance to bitch, moan... or even rant if you will about such experiences, good, bad or indifferent.

As to the comment to grow up... This is the crux of the fucking matter, right here. Droidy is... to say nicely, a petite woman. Yes she is short and doesn't look her age. This causes a lot of problems when she is shopping at various stores, they look at her and think she is having them on... until she whips out a credit card or I go along with her. So it could be said that droidy is always ready for less than stellar customer service, this time however it was worse than usual.

Everybody has off days.,... it could be said I'm having one right now reading this pandering shite.

... and no she isn't Princess Diana.... droidy is alive and not some mouldering corpse that people still try put on a pedastal for her supposed charm, insipid beauty and the fact she married a blue-blooded in-bred who is part of an outdated anachronistic closed soceity.


And I'll put this as a warning to further commentors on this thread. You want to share a different experience at the places named above? Fine, go for it.... you want to attack the author because she wrote about her bad experience.... well you are in for a world of me ranting, yelling and generally having fun.

Posted by: Decay on October 6, 2003 01:30 PM

and... I'll just show these images...



so is it Maria? or Susan or Monica?

2 entries, one IP address, 12 minutes apart, 3 names... hmmmmm

It could also be LS.... different day, different IP, but same network provider....


Posted by: Decay on October 6, 2003 01:38 PM

yeah you go decay!
we don't like people being nasty to droidy!

Posted by: b on November 24, 2003 11:16 AM

This Brides of Armidale really is a fucking joke. So Monica and Maria, even though you may be two different people (supposedly) I do wonder if you are not employees or friends, you have the same IP, I'd say you're both using the same computer on the same session. I must say I've heard nothing but bad reports about Brides Of Armidale. It even gets a good rap on the Not Good Enough site which can be found at www.notgoodenough.org and is a website promoting consumer advocacy. I live in Melbourne and are getting married next September. I have already filled my fiance in on the reports from different sources about Brides of Armidale and have cautioned her against having anything to do with them when she's dress shopping with her bridesmaids. I hope the wedding went well for you guys!

Posted by: Pigsie on November 29, 2003 05:26 PM

droidy has lots of friends who care and stick up for her...i know about notgoodenough.org website, i joined it to gripe about kodak...then i got addicted...

so in a comment i mentioned that my friend got bad service from brides of armadale and mentioned how people can reach droidy's entry....(you can't actually post up a weblink....so hopefully that will teach brides of armadale not be to be rude as they don't know who they are dealing with!

droidy's wedding was really cool! everyone looked superb!

Posted by: b on December 1, 2003 12:02 PM

That's great to hear b, what is your username on NGE?

One of my fiance's friends is making her dress for her as she's in the business, she also reckons Brides of Armadale are dodge big time, not to mention very snooty. Our wedding is almost upon us, getting very excited!

Posted by: Pigsie on July 22, 2004 05:55 PM

I found your comments really interesting. I have found my dress at BOA and I loved it, the service was ok with the chinese woman but there was another lady who worked there and was pretty rude. I was asking the chinese lady something about the beading on a dress, and the other lady interrupted with- this is the manager you know, I looked at her and said, what on earth does that have to do with anything, she said oh I thought you would like to know, I said not really relevant to beading and glared at her. Anyway I loved my dress so was happy to let it go. SO Anyway, my layby docket says the dress will be available in August ok its now the end of August and I havent even gone for a first fitting! So annoyed. I called and she said no it means the dress will arrive at the start of August, I said ok fair enough so it must be there now- she said umm no it will be here at the end of August. I am giving them till the 31st to have my dress, they will not get one more cent from me until they have it there. So pissed off and annoyed. Honestly I dont agree that all their dresses are dirty- i thought they were clean and not all are meringues- there are some really nice ones- but I will say that customer service is absolutely crap and I am so angry with them- if I already hadnt paid 800 of my layby I would tell them to go jump!

Posted by: Irene on August 25, 2004 05:38 PM

does rantspace still come up with brides of armadale when you do a search?

irene - with your comment int he fact yo disagree that their dresses are dirty etc...you have to look at the date of this entry - March 3 2003 - 1.5 years ago - stock, designs and fashions change...and perhaps they have been cleaned by now too..

Posted by: b on August 25, 2004 08:41 PM

LOL, I was so mad I didn't even look at the date!
Yep it's still in there =)

Posted by: Irene on August 26, 2004 08:08 AM

LOL, I was so mad I didn't even look at the date!
Yep it's still in there =)

Posted by: Irene on August 26, 2004 08:08 AM

OMG, was it really one a half years ago? Man, i can still that sour face as if it was yesterday!!!

Posted by: Guru G on August 26, 2004 08:37 PM

I went to Brides of Armadale on Saturday, and oh my God have never been spoken to or treated so rudely in my life.

Really can't understand how they stay in business with such appalling customer service.

Advice to people shopping for dresses: don't even go in there to look!!

Posted by: Clare on June 20, 2005 09:37 AM
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