The Dress Snafu...

After "patiently" waiting 10 weeks the dresses arrived!  The bridesmaids and my mother's dress came in a week early, so we went to pick them up  and they were amazing.  It was so exciting!  Finally everything started to feel real.  I was actually getting married.

The next week my dress arrived.  After seeing how good the bridesmaid dresses turned out I was ecstatic to see mine.  We got to Formal Affairs the moment it was supposed to open, but Jean wasn't there.  The shop was closed.  I had a horrifying 10 seconds flash through my mind of every single possible natural disaster occurring all at once that could prevent Jean from opening the shop that day...or ever again.  Mom suggested we go have lunch and come back.  Smart woman.

We came back and the shop was open.  (Whew!)  Jean was just as excited to see the dress as I was.  She was also thrilled that I had ordered early exclaiming, "An October bride all squared away by June?  You're a dream come true!"   However, upon opening the box she got the most horrified expression on her face.  "Was this dress supposed to have a lace back?" she asked.  I said, "The one I tried on did...does it not?"  She rushed over and pulled the sample and sure enough it had a corset back.  We had discussed this at length; that with my heavy bust a corset backed dress would save me a fortune in alterations.  She slowly pulled my dress out to reveal it had a button back.  75 beautiful little buttons that would never button around my bust.  She said she didn't even know this dress had a button back option!  I suggested we put it on and see what happens.

It wasn't good.

I asked what we could do.  She said we could have alterations put a corset back in the dress and then got a very stern look on her face.  "That's not good enough.  I'm going to make a call."  She gets on the phone with Alfred Angelo.  It turns out the representative that took the order ordered the dress wrong.  I assumed I was just stuck with dress, but that wasn't the case.  Alfred Angelo offered to remake the entire dress for me with the correct back on rush order.  No charge to me.  They also agreed to take the other dress back.  (which they never do at all.)  Jean assumed she'd just have to eat the cost of the first dress, but they were even willing to make things right with her.  Jean reordered the dress and prepared for me to freak out since the new dress would be here only a few weeks before the wedding, but she promised to have it steamed and aisle ready for me.  I laughed and hugged her.  "This is why we ordered early.  Something had to go wrong somewhere and if this is the only thing that goes wrong with this wedding I will count my blessings!"

I'm so glad I chose to buy from Formal Affairs.  There is just something so wonderful about buying a product from someone personally invested in it.  If this had happened at David's Bridal I doubt their sales rep would have been so willing to bend over backwards to make things right.  This could have been a seriously upsetting experience, but I have absolutely no worries that this is going to turn out fine.

The Offending Buttons

The Corset Back