House Of Brides
Reviews and Complaints

Purchased a wedding gown from House of Brides in Schaumburg, ill in March 2018. Paid in full on that day. In July started inquiring about my daughters wedding dress. Was looking for a date of delivery. Wedding date 12/22/18. I was told multiple times by phone receptionist it would arrive 4 weeks prior to wedding date. I told them that's not acceptable, need the dress prior to 4 weeks of 12/22/18 date. There web site states 6 to 12 weeks of purchase? So it's been 4 months. It took the manager Kris a month to call us back. She asked my daughter when do u want it. My daughter replied first couple weeks of October.
Miraculously, the dress showed up end of Septmber. We picked it up that day. It hung at my house until her first fitting, third week if Oct. Once she had the dress on, the seamstress asked if she had lost alot of weight because the dress was way to big on her. No she had not. That's when we started looking at tags. To my shock, the takes looked old and very suspicious. The size was written on a tag in magic marker, it was also stamped in purple ink. Had mannequin typed on it. It had the word declined written in very faded magic marker AND blue and pink lines in magic marker? What kind ok f designer sends a brand new dress to a customer like this? Started looking at the dress and found the under bussel strap the be pretty dirty as well as the bottom if the dress. I have pictures. I paid full price for a dress I'm pretty sure is a floor model. I have spoke to the manager CV xd3who denies, of course and would not give me any direction on furthering my complaint. The bride is devastated to say the least. She further blamed this dirty clearly used dress on Mori Lee, the designer. I'm pretty sure they will confirm this is not a dress they sent! I need an investigation of some sort done on this!

Shame on HOB for their vagueness when asked any questions, their inability to answer questions, and their downright rudeness when speaking with their customers.

We are asking about a dress. At one month out from the wedding, I believe we have that right. Each time we call we are put on hold for endless amounts of time and then told, "It looks like it will ship next week." Well I think the ship has sailed, without our dress, and HOB's has no lifeboat to spare.

A little kindness and honesty could keep them afloat but not with managers like Chris Richards of Schaumburg, or Alana the phone person who forgets that we all have jobs.

There seem to be a lot of brides who are concerned about their dresses, or their bridesmaids dresses and all HOB needs to do is help.Stop being so elusive or apologetic about the past and give us some direction on what options we have available. Someone their needs to step out and take charge.

No one cares about a sinking ship that didn't even offer a life vest.

My daughter ordered her dress and it was paid IN FULL in February.
The wedding is 12 days away and we still have no bridal gown.
When we constantly call the Orland Park store we are given the
run around and told it will be in.
I feel like we have no rights or choice in what is going to happen with
this bridal gown.
This store must be use to this type of incident since the manager
called the police because I was upset and asked questions that she
refused to answer.
What if the dress doesn't come in?
We need to get the flower girl dress and need to match her dress ; how
can we do this with no dress?
The manager refused to give me her last name, her boss's name, and
did not answer my questions at all.

My daughter ordered a wedding dress. It came in and fit perfectly. We were charged $400 to attach a belt we provided and do the bustling. The bustling was done by placing loops on the train in the middle of the lace layer and looks terrible. We were told by Nancy that it had been fixed and looked perfect when we picked up the dress. She would not let us try it on or look at it as it was "steamed and pinned up for travel". Upon looking at it at home IT WAS NOT fixed. Returned the dress and manager Jennifer said it would be fixed and then shipped to me in Charleston SC. It is Tuesday and I have been trying to get it shipped to me since last Friday. I need it by Thursday for an alterations appt Friday to see if the dress can be fixed. Yesterday I was promised it would BD shipped today - did not happen!

Look at all of the negative reviews!
Do not shop here!

My wedding is august 6, 2016. I ordered my dress on november 8, 2015 so that I would have enough time to receive the dress and have it altered.

The dress I chose was also listed on hob’s own website for a much less money. The manager begrudgingly “price matched” their own website (Which says that this dress will arrive in 14-16 weeks)

I was told the dress would arrive in april or may. No updates at all until I call the store at the end of may (25+ weeks).

This is my first experience with nadia, the store’s “manager” who made a number of excuses and tells me that the dress will come in 3rd week of june! Obviously, this is a problem because I still need to have the dress altered. Finally, nadia offers to email the manufacturer for an update. I asked to be copied on the email and nadia refuses!

Nadia calls me with an update that the dress will come in mid-june, and that she’ll get a tracking number the first week of june and will let me know. I call again in the first week of june for the tracking number update — no number. They say it has been delayed a week. I call the beginning of the 2nd week of june, no tracking number, but “the dress will be in no later than friday.” I get a call thursday that the dress won’t come in that week after all, that it’ll be next week — now the 3rd week of june!

All I heard repeatedly was “your wedding isn’t until august, you’ll be fine.”

My dress finally arrives june 20th (They told the manufacturer on the order form that my wedding was june 26!). My fiancé comes with me to help me talk to the manager about my bad experience and late delivery, and request a discount for the extra rush fees i’ll have to pay to get my dress altered in 5 weeks now. Nadia refuses. Nadia wouldn’t even acknowledge that it was late or that it was promised to me by may.

When asked about compensation for the rush alteration fees, she said she couldn’t possibly give any other discounts because she already discounted the dress (Remember from earlier: she price matched her own website!). Nadia claims that the only thing she can do is not charge us the $27 for the garment bag (Which again, online is only $15). Any time my fiancé asked her a question where the answer would make her look bad she would just say “no” and not answer the question. It was like arguing with a 4 year old.

Nadia could tell that we were visibly upset, and so when we go to pay the remaining $325 balance of the dress she tells us she accepts only cash or debit. This is incredibly ironic because I had just read another dissatisfied customer’s yelp post explaining this scam while I was waiting in their store (See “jezail l.’s yelp post from 4/13/16). Obviously nadia has had a lot of trouble with dissatisfied customers cancelling their charges. Hilariously enough, nadia still has the two clear signs on the counter (As referenced in the other post) that says they accept all major credit cards. At this point, my fiancé told nadia we would pay her by credit card or walk out with the dress. All of a sudden she took credit cards again.

I had to search all over chicago to find an alteration shop that could handle my dress in such a short time frame, and as a result have had to pay extra because of house of brides. It is obvious that house of brides is not worried about repeat customers (And it’s the perfect business for that).

If you didn’t get it already, i’d recommend you go anywhere else for your dress.

I ordered3 wedding gowns during their sale. At the sale price I could get them and then choose and sell the ones I didn't want. Out of the three gowns all three are terrible! Just because something is on sale or clearance, it should be stated if it is in poor condition!
Gown 1 - very dirty around bottom and will have to be dry cleaned to wear and the corset lace is missing.
Gown 2 - zipper is broken and will have to be replaced
Gown 3 - dirty around bottom and missing a lot of beads

Do not buy from them if you are expecting a gown that you will be able to wear without dry cleaning or repairs. My dry cleaner will charge $125 for cleaning the gown and the replacement corset lace is $26. I could have found a preowned gown for the same or less!

On top of it, they were very rude when I contacted them.

I ordered 6 bridesmaid dresses at the end of oct 2013. My wedding is April 4th 2014. Was told I would get my dresses by end of jan beginning of feb 2014. I called HOB the first time 3 business days ago and have called everyday sometimes twice a day. I am only calling to get a status update and to make sure everything is ok with my order. I called the order center first they ask for my order number and name I give it to them and they tell me they can't pull up my order because they have limited access in the order center they give me another number to call area code 630 I call that number only to get voicemail. I tell them I'm only calling to check up on my order make sure it's ok no one has called me back. I have called order center several times talk with different people they always tell me they can't pull up my order to call the other number. Today I said no I'm not calling the other number they don't call back. I spoke with a guy supervisor named Tim he said he would send a message to them to call me back it was urgent. I have also sent emails and have heard nothing back. I've never ordered anything on line before and now after numerous calls and reading reviews I am freaking out! I have lost sleep over this it's all I can think about now after reading reviews and how others have called and called and got no response back from them. I don't know what to do next or how to go about getting an answer from them. Like if there's an issue tell me so I can get dresses else where I just need someone anyone to confirm my order. What scares me is that the people at the order center ask for my order number and name after I tell them
I want to check on my order and then they tell me they can't pull it up. Why even ask then. I'm seriously going to cry. I should have just got the darn dressed through the shop here even tho they were $100 more. Omg what if I don't get my dresses what am I going to do. So heart broken stressed and anxious. Anyone have any other numbers to call to speak with someone?

These people are pathetic! They could care less if you have a disaster or not! I ordered my dress online in July, and they will not return my phone calls! My event is 12 days away, AND I HAVE NO DRESS! I refused to order in the store, the ladies there were all stuck up and RUDE! I cannot believe what I am going thru, and it is all their fault! I am SOOOOOOOOOO MAD!

I placed an order of 4 bridesmaids dresses, a veil and groomsmen's ties in good faith with HOB and paid for everything up front via PayPal as I was instructed to do. There were no delays in them getting back to me asking for additional funds for shipping - which I paid. 16 weeks went by, then I started calling to find out where my order was - you get passed from one person to the next, go through to voicemail (they NEVER call back!) then one girl finally told me my order was ready to ship - total lie! Couldn't ever get through to her again! Then they eventually sent a shipping confirmation to say they had sent part of my order, 2 dresses were missing! Again more calls and emails at which point 20 weeks had passed and my wedding was fast approaching - I started asking for a refund on these 2 missing dresses resigning myself to the fact my colour scheme was ruined and I would need to find a different colour and style of dress here in the UK to at least make it look like I had planned it that way! They completely ignored my requests and some woman called Karen there would keep lying to us if she even bothered to respond and then decided to send one dress the week of my wedding with a broken zipper and then the day before my wedding I received notification from customs that a dress had arrived and that once I paid taxes etc they would release it - a bit late the day before my wedding! Following my big day HOB still mess me about every time I call, promise to call back and don't and I've seen that I will never get my money back for the 2 dresses they messed up on - meaning in all I ended up buying 6 dresses for my wedding, so didn't save anything ordering from the alleged "world's number 1 bridal superstore" - total fabrication . How this company is still operating is beyond me - they couldn't care less about anybody's wedding & will just take your money! A word of warning from someone who has been through it, pay a little more and go somewhere else for your bridal needs and completely avoid HOB like the plague! They will give you unnecessary stress and not much else - they are abysmal and that's putting it mildly!

Do not use house of brides unless you want your wedding to be ruined.
We chose house of brides because it was the site with the cheapest dresses we could find on the internet. We ordered our bridesmaid dresses in late january for my best friend's wedding which was may 18. House of brides notified us that we would be getting our dresses in mid april. When may 1st rolled around we decided to take matters into our own hands and contact house of brides. It was not until I took initiative myself that they realized there was a problem. After about 50+ phone calls to them over a 2 week span (Since they never can call anyone back) we figured everything out, or at least we thought we did. So many things went wrong, one of the dresses was completely wrong. We were to have short red sweetheart neckline dresses and one of the girls got a long halter top dress. House of brides knew they would not have have the time to have the designer make this dress, so they made a make shift one. As for the other dresses, we got them a day before the wedding. I had to get mine altered and had to spend an arm and a leg on alterations since it was such short notice. Another girl got in on the day of the wedding since she was from out of town and the dress that was delivered to her parent's house was actually the wrong dress as well. It was a long dress with a halter top. She had to rush to an alterations store to take care of it on the day of the wedding and she had to miss the bridesmaids luncheon and hair/ makeup appts. I called and called house of brides for them to do something for all of us. All I asked for was a partial refund for the girls who got their dresses the day before the wedding and a full refund for the girls whose dresses were wrong. I do not know what they did about the girls whose dresses were wrong but I know as for the partial refund they refused to give that to us. They blamed the designer's lateness and did not take any form of responsibility. All I got was a "sorry for any stressed caused". It was not a sincere apology at all. No bride should ever have to go through a bridesmaids dress fiasco like my best friend did and they won't as long as they do not use house of brides. Yes, they might be cheap but their customer service is terrible and they do not care about you or your wedding what-so-ever. Your weddings is supposed to be an exciting time and house of brides only brings stress and unhappiness. Say "I don't" to house of brides.

I placed an order with House of Brides on January 7th and recieved an email that my dresses would come in sometime in "Early April". Early April has come and gone, and I've now called 8 times trying to get an update on the status of my order.

It scares me to read all of the reviews posted here. I too have been told that I'd receive a response in 24-48 hours (haven't received a single response over the last 2 weeks!), have been told my request has been marked as "urgent", and have been given the direct line to their ordering reps [protected] for any of you who have been given the runaround from reps and managers at the main customer service number), who won't be in until Monday.

I'm incredibly disappointed by the customer service of this company. I even had one rep tell me, "Well, we call this "Wedding Christmas"...it's the busiest time of the year..." I've worked in customer service too, and busy or not, one does not make false promises about a timeframe to get back to a customer!

Update: Have been calling the number listed above for the past week. On Monday, I got in touch with Marlene, who told me that a huge shipment of Dessy bridesmaid dresses got held up in customs as they shipped from China to the USA. Awesome. She then noted that a big shipment was due that day and that she'd get back to me later in the day to let me know if my dresses were in the shipment.

Monday came and went with no answer. So did Tuesday. I called back on Wednesday and let another rep know that I hadn't gotten a response yet. They told me that they'd leave a message (yet again) and get back to me the next day.

The rest of the week came and went. It's now I week after I contacted their "direct line" and still no word on the dresses and no response from the company. I can accept that there may have been a shipping fluke while going through customs. I can understand if they are very busy and backordered. What I cannot understand is the blatant lack of customer service that I have received. They keep telling me, "Oh...you have plenty of time to get the dresses in", despite the fact that I've repeatedly told them that these dresses need to be shipped to various gals across the country for alterations.

The bridesmaids are getting anxious, I'm exhausted trying to figure this out, and I cannot overstate how much I discourage fellow brides from using this company.

Today I called The House of Brides in Aurora, IL, to inquire about the advantages and disadvantages of placing my order of 5 Bill Levkoff #560 bridesmaids' dresses online opposed to at the store location, the HOB representative "Molly" told me that it was to my advantage to place the order of the dresses with the physical store location as the bridesmaids were able to get the "online price" if they ordered in a group.

I decided to register my group's orders for the Aurora location, and relayed this to my bridesmaids. My sister was the second bridesmaid to place her order with the aforementioned HOB Aurora store. Upon purchasing the dress, my sister learned that her dress would not cost the promised "$127" to match the online price, but instead my sister was charged for shipping and sales tax, which totaled to be nearly $200 (this included an additional fee for a plus size, of which I am not disputing).

Learning of this, I contacted the Aurora HOB store and spoke with "Eilene" who identified herself as the store manager. Eilene initially stated that the price was higher due to the HOB online price increasing since I last reviewed it. While on the phone, I confirmed the online price of "$127" was still listed on the site. Eilene then said that the online listed $127 price did not reflect the real charges which included insurance. I then reviewed and confirmed for Eilene the online 2012 promotion stating that insurance was free. I, then, asked Eilene why she would not honor what was relayed to me; I was told that my bridesmaids would be charged the online price. Eilene, the self-identified, store manager still would not honor the $127, and stated that she would refund my bridesmaids' orders placed prior my call, which would take a week or more, as she needed to contact "corporate to get a refund code". I requested to have this in writing, stating that I could no longer rely on the verbal statements of this place of business. Eilene refused to acknowledge this in writing.

The dishonest and unreliable business practices of this location do not reflect well on the House of Brides, and has ultimately cost your corporation over five hundred dollars and poor reviews, as I have decided to no longer order my bridesmaids' dresses through the House of Brides, and will share with others my bad experience.

I ordered a dress from house of brides in america as it was alot cheaper than here in the uk and as im on a tight budget it was the answer to my prayers or so i thought.they took the money out of my bank within seconds of me paying for it then emailed me 5 days later to say they couldnt ship my dress.they then told me i would have to wait 30 buisness days for my money back …ive emailed them a few times as the 30 days is up now and they dont email back and i havnt had my refund..ive explained that my wedding is in 12 weeks and i cant buy a dress untill they refund …anyone know what i can do about this .

Worst experience ever! I ordered my 7 bridesmaids dresses from house of brides. I encountered mistake after countless mistake on their part. First, they put the wrong dress on my account for all of my bridesmaids to order. I only noticed this by chance on a visit I made, if I had not, I cannot even explain how awful it would have been. Following that, house of brides told me a sash color that was not available for the dress I chose so no one could order the correct color due to the fact that the color they chose was for a completely different designer. Upon getting fitted for this dress, my consultant told each of my bridesmaids that they were at least a full 4 sizes larger than their true size.in one case, she told her that she needed a 28 when she is a 14! Ridiculous. On one of my 1-hour drive trips to house of brides, I was told by a different consultant that the dresses I chose were discontinued in less than a month, so they needed to be ordered within the next 2 days in order to get them on time. I had told my bridesmaids they had at least 2 more months! What if they had not stumbled upon this fact and decided to mention it to me? After this I got my bridesmaids together and they agreed to get the dresses right away. For the next 4 days I attempted to call house of brides about 15 times per day. Finally on the fourth day I got in touch with someone who told me that the internet and phones had been down for the past 4 days. What?! How can that happen? Forward your calls. Do something to make sure you do not lose business and keep your customers at ease. I tried to be kind throughout all of this, but finally I had to call and ask the house of brides to take the name of my consultant off of my account and give me a different one. I told them I no longer wanted to be contacted by her and I did not want my bridesmaids speaking with her as I was worried about her ability to make my order correctly. I made this very clear and they assured me it would not be a problem. The next day she called me and knew nothing about me asking for her to not contact me anymore. On the same day, she called one of my bridesmaids and talked to her for about 5 minutes about all of the orders before my bridesmaid corrected the consultant and let her know that she was, in fact, not the bride. She told the consultant that she needed to call me about these items and she asked her for my phone number! After about 4 months of working together... Shouldn't she have a note or something about who is who? I have to say, these are only a few of the things that have happened with my experience. This whole experience has been so upsetting I cannot even begin to explain. I have not had any sort of assurance of what I will get the entire time. My bridesmaids have already paid and ordered their dresses, so it would be very difficult to change anything at this point. If I can give any words of advice to others, I would say please do not go to this store. Don't even attempt it. It is not worth your stress. Make your experience a fun and confident one... Go somewhere else!

I ordered three Alfred Angelo dresses style number Alfred angelo 7044 victorian lilac from the immediate delivery section. This was done via email by a lady named Karen at phone number as I was told I could not have the original dresses I ordered. I paid for the three dresses but I only received two. I have called and emailed for over two months now but noone has got back to me. They have happily got my money but no dress! This is theft and is illegal. I am having to call from Australia which is very expensive to be constantly doing this. Her number is [protected] ext 308

We ordered a wedding dress from the line of available items for delivery within 7 business days or less. After 10 days of waiting I called to find out what was going on with my order to just experience what been ignored means.
They ignored us for at least five days. Then Shannon from the Headquarters called and told us that the initial dress my fiancée picked was no longer available for her.
Shannon then suggested another dress she stated that was available for immediate delivery however my fiancée didn’t like it thus she picked another dress. Shannon from headquarters told us this new dress was available and that she would get back to us the same with information of delivery date.
That was the last we heard from them. We called repeatedly to no avail, and every time we called we had to state our names so she just completely ignored us.
Now we ran out of time because the wedding is in 30 days. Unbelievable how we were treaded and ignored by everyone involved in the process of getting a wedding dress.
My fiancée cries everyday because she feels that these people ruined her wedding plans and they express nothing for it. They just don’t care.
The president of this company should know what’s going on with the business, her name is Iva Buziecki and I am 100% sure that if she knew these problems were going on she would do something about it, after all she’s the president of the company.
I recommend everybody to make an actual compliant with the better business bureau and my personal feelings are that maybe someone will hear about this and do something about it.

Do not buy from house of brides! Take it from this bride to be, it will not be worth your tears, anger, frustration, hurt and fear! Please please please do not shop here! The manager michelle is a liar. My wedding dress is still not in, and my wedding is less than 2 months away! The estimated ship time from the designers website is 12-16 weeks. It's now been 22. Michelle (The manager) will not take my phone calls despite multiple messages they have taken. I have been given 4 different estimates on when not only my wedding gown, but also my bridesmaid gown and flower girl dress will be in. Each time myself or my fiance has called (Or gone in), they have told me a different date when my dresses will be in with no explanation as to why. My flower girl dress will likely not be in in time for the wedding, despite assurances when we ordered that it would be in in plenty of time for alterations. I don't even know if i'll have the wedding dress I ordered in time! I have been treated with nothing but disrespect and they have been nothin but rude and deceiving. Do not shop at house of brides! It has ruined my entire bridal gown experience, and now has me scared I wasted alot of money, on a dream dress I won't get to wear!
Zero stars!

House of brides buyers beware! On thursday, feb. 17th I inquired about 9 alfred angelo #7138 dresses for girls in my daughter's quinceanera, and asked what I had to do to receive them by april 10th for our event on april 30th. Was told as long as I paid $25 rush shipping charge per dress for shipping from the designer to hob, and then also pay for express shipping from hob to me, that I was guaranteed to have the dresses. On friday morning of the 18th, I went online and placed my order, following the above instructions. My total was $1385.97. Another person for my event called on tuesday, feb 22nd (Monday was a holiday) to place an order for 3 additional dresses (Same design). She was allowed to place her order and they took her payment over the phone. They then proceeded to tell her that our dresses would not be available for rush shipping so we would not have them by our event date of april 30th. She asked to cancel her order and they said they would, but she would have to call another number to ask for a refund. She informed me, and I right away called hob concerned about my order. I was told by the man who answered the phone that they would not be able to get my order to me by april 10th or april 30th! I was furious and asked if I could just cancel my order, it was only 1 business day after I placed my order due to the holiday. He told me I could cancel but would have to take a message and have a customer service rep call me back. Since then, now 4 days later, i've placed over 10 calls and sent 6 emails and have not received any calls back. I keep getting told by the people who answer the phone there is nothing they can do and they will have someone call me back. But they never call back, and they do not respond to emails! During one of the phone calls, I learned that house of brides stores have nothing to do with their own website. This is absurd and unacceptable. I called every phone number on the website, i've even called the actual stores but they obviously can not help. This place has no customer service dept. I've since filed a bbb complaint, done several complaints online, and am looking into the illinois attorney general. I also called my debit card bank and was told to open a dispute with visa which I plan to do as soon as I can.

ross.e.[protected]@abc.com

Please email with any complaints but in particular we are looking for refund issues. From what we are hearing it can take from 2 to 6 months to get a refund and only if you call over and over.
Please provide your contact information when you respond.

Thanks!

ross.e.[protected]@abc.com
[protected]