Stay away!!! You get better customer service at McDonalds than Adriennes's bridal (AB). I originally went there to try on a Jim Hjelm dress and brought along my cousin and two bestfriends. The owner, Mariann, was late to my first appointment by 15 mins. I shrugged it off, but this was an indication of what's to come... That same day my cousin Anne (also engaged) wanted to try on a wedding dress for fun (she had no intention of buying) but ended up falling in love with a dress. The dress was nothing special, in my opinion, it was extremely outdated. (Imagine a quinceanera dress in satan) Mariann offered her a deal, 1k alterations included. Frankly, we paid Mariann a thousand dollars to take an old dress off her hands!!!
We went back for three more dress fittings ...
Fitting number 1- Mariann was late, again! We arrived promptly at 11am for our appointment. We were not allowed into the store because the owner did not arrive. Even though the seamstress was in the basement, she was strictly told not to let anyone in, even if they have an appointment. Luck for us the weather was not that bad in March. Can you image if it was January?!?! We patiently waited outside the store front until Mariann arrived.
Fitting number 2- There was a miscommunication breakdown between us and Mariann. I wanted my mother to see my dress and my cousin's at the same time. My cousin's availability clashed with my mom's so we stuck to the regular 11am appointment schedule. Somehow, Mariann thought we would both show up at 6pm that day. Under the assumption that our appointment was at 11am, we arrived AB and she was no where in sight. Her assistant, I can't recall her name (but should be either a family member or employee of hers) blamed us for showing up at the wrong time. Did not apologize or take any responsibility for what happened. Kept telling us that Mariann was on her way... we waited over an hours and a half until her 12pm appointment arrived. Another man, also came in to pick up a dress that morning and walked out empty handed because Mariann was working on it the night before and was late on delivering the dress. Her 12pm appointment came in to try on a bride's maid dress and had to come back because Mariann's assistant didn't know how much the dress cost.
Fitting number 3- Mariann was barely on time here. Not much to complain about here. Everything seemed like it was running smoothly...
Fitting number 4- We learned our lesson... My cousin asked Mariann what time she was able to show up since 11am seems to be a problem for her. Mariann said at 12pm, my cousin would be able to walk out with her wedding dress in hand. I arrived a little early and bumped into the UPS delivery guy and did some small talk. He basically said, Mariann is the worst business owner ever! He has to ring the buzzer 10 million times just to get the seamstress to open the door to pick up Mariann's delivery. Her business hours start at 11am, but no one if ever there! One hour later, Mariann is nowhere in sight and her assistant (the same one that gave us a hard time at fitting #2) arrived on Mariann's behalf. My cousin had one final fitting to see if any work needed to be done to it before we paid the other 50%. Mariann's assistant said it's ready, I just have to press it. If you WANT to try it on, she'll press it afterwards. It's not that we WANT to try it on, we NEED/SHOULD try it on. We tried the dress on and found stains still on the dress. She said and I quote, "Maybe you guys did it?!?!" and then suggested that my cousin's 16 year old tattoo on her wrist might be the cause of the stain!!! WHAT?!?! We scanned the dress and found more stains, it was still damp from recently being cleaned and the beadings on the dress were hanging off by the thread. It seems like the just started working on it the night before. My cousin wanted me in the fitting room with her when she took the dress off, but Mariann's assistant ran into the fitting room with us and said she's responsible for the dress and that she needed to be around. WHAT?!?! You guys had two weeks to take care of this dress and now you want to take responsibility of this dress?
We are now approaching 1:15pm and Mariann just walked into the store. Approaches her assistant and says, "I am so tired, I worked all night on the dress (referring to another client's dress)." Says "hi" to us and breezes down to the basement and disappears for 45mins! We kept asking how much longer? "She's almost done cleaning, she is bagging the dress right now." We don't want you to bag the dress, we still need to inspect it! At 2:30, we see Mariann and the wedding dress, there are still stains and some of the beadwork is still hanging by the thread.
We are pissed now! I told her that I have another appointment later at 3, her response "You can do to the appointment, you don't need Anne (my cousin)." EXCUSE ME?!?! Did I just hear that correctly? Why would I - 1. not want to be here for my cousin's final fitting, since I'll be the one to put her in the dress during the wedding and I'm responsible for the trying the bustle?!?!? 2- Go to my venue appointment alone?!?! 3- Who gave you the right to tell me how I should be planning my own wedding?
At this point, it was so late that Mariann's next appointment already arrived with her entire family for her dress fitting.
My cousin demanded a refund. Mariann said, "NO!" We selected a sample dress and this is what we get. She insisted she gave us a good deal. This dress is so outdated, we did you a deal by taking this off your hands! Either way, we paid for something and we expect the dress to look brand new, clean and bead-work and threads attached to the dress. At this point her face is red and tears are starting to come out.
We argued and explain that a common courtesy call to inform us the night before to tell us that the dress might not be 100% ready. We would have been okay with that. We just did not appreciate her wasting our time and blaming us for something we did not do.
My cousin threaten to picket outside the store until she got her refund. At one point Mariann offered us to take the dress as is for $500 dollars. She turned it down and wanted the refund. Whenever we see this dress, we'll associate it to this terrible experience we have. Finally, Mariann agreed to the refund and insisted that we were making a big mistake as my cousin was signing the refund receipt.
In the store, I looked up the reviews on saw 2.5 stars out of 80 reviews. Almost 99.9% had something negative to say about their experience. This place was also on fox 5 news - the report suggested that they would sell you fake designer wedding dresses.
I called another bridal salon, Wedding Atelier, told them our story and booked us an appointment within the hour. We walked out of there in 2 hours with a potential wedding dress that was 100x better than the first one at AB. Our experience there was night and day. Keep in mind, we have exactly 1.5 weeks until my cousin's wedding, and they have 7 days to alter a sample size wedding dress down to a size 0! Our sales associate Jessica made everything better. She worked with her budget and was really honest with what would look good on my cousin. We did not feel pressure despite the pressing time frame. The store was clean and bright. Just go to WA!!! Trust me, you will not regret this.
Wish I read the reviews about this place before hand.
O yea, when I was across the streets at Adrienne's bridesmaid store- I left my purse in the front and forgot to take it with me to the fitting room area. I think that's where Mariann's sales lady dug into my wallet and stole $200 dollars from it. The store was closed off to the public, if people wanted to come in they would have to be buzzed in order to come in. I thought it was safe... should have known better. The only time I have ever let me guard down, I get robbed.