Hello, hello, hello!!
As you may have guessed from the title, I am so NOT happy with Fabletics. I really wanted to love them, but they have done nothing but disappoint me so far. Before I go on, this isn’t meant to “slam” the brand, I don’t like to do that, but I DO take pride in being honest with my opinions. I’m honest with product reviews, and tell you the good AND the bad.
However, I don’t like the idea of just randomly “smearing” a company. I’m well aware that people are human and mistakes happen, so prior to writing something negative about a company in general, I contact customer service or PR. Most often, the problem is due to an accidental oversight, and it’s resolved immediately. In this case, though, the problems seemed to keep growing, and there appears to be a serious lack of efficient SOP. I will also follow-up after this post, and let you all know the final outcome.
My friend, Courtney, has always talked about how much she loves her Fabletics leggings. She swears by their comfort and quality, and she always looks FABulous. (She’s a super-duper make-up artist, by the way, so check out her page here!) So, I finally decided to give them a shot when they had a special deal going on.
Unfortunately, my experience with Fabletics has been nothing short of Hell on earth. I swear, the marketing and SOP of this company is all led by demons from the deepest pits of Hell, all sent to create havoc and provide payback for all the bad karma we earthlings have accrued.
First Strike
The first strike with Fabletics is the entire shopping and ordering process. When I went to the site, I couldn’t even look at the clothing options without offering up my soul. Or so it seemed. You have to put in all your info, and take a “quiz” about your “style” and preferences before they will even show you any clothes.
This is ridiculous because I do many different types of activities that require different workout gear. So, there’s no one answer to their “quiz.” Secondly, they claim that all the information is so they can better match you to appropriate items, but I started think it’s more like they want my info so they can sell it.
I finally selected an outfit I liked, the Catherine, which consisted of a long-sleeved black top and Cirrus print full-length leggings. Then when I went to check out, it turns out I had to sign up for their “VIP” program, at a cost of $49 per month charged to my card, to even get the price that was advertised, or I had to pay over $130.00. This should have been made more clear in their advertisement, but it seems they bank on the idea that people will go ahead and sign up after all the trouble they’ve gone through to even get to that point. Guess they knew what they were doing by making me hand over my soul just to browse, huh?
Fabletics Catherine outfit
Well, in the interest of trying the products out, I went ahead and took their bait, and I trust Courtney’s opinion. I placed the order, then found out they use FedEx Smartpost. Arrrggghhhh…!!! I placed the order on January 2 (actually early morning, so it was like the night of January 1), and it wasn’t scheduled to arrive for a long time, so I sat around waiting for my hair to gray.
Sorry, FedEx, but I really loathe you! We don’t have a FedEx location in our area, so a driver comes from a nearby town for a very short, random, period of time every now and then. If you have to sign for something, forget about it if you have a job or you’re not home, you won’t get your stuff, it will get returned to the sender. And FedEx Smartpost is soooooo… SLOOOOWWWW…
Second Strike
Well, my order finally arrived on January 10. Despite having to wait so long, I was SOOOOOO excited! I couldn’t wait to try this stuff on! I was stoked because I was really looking forward to wearing it for my end-of-the-week long-distance cold-weather run. Ooh, I couldn’t wait!!
So, I opened the package, and noticed a little box. Ooh! How sweet of them to include something extra! But then, I noticed the print on the leggings beneath- it was different. Wtf? Upon further examination, I noticed that they sent Havana capris, underwear, 2 pastel sports bras, and a tank top. W. T. F.
I hate pastels. Whoever ordered this stuff has excellent taste, the styles are awesome- but the water quality here is atrocious, and it’s often brown. Yes, brown water. So, when you go to wash light colored clothes, they end up discolored. Bad water combined with the fact that I’m not truly a southerner and I don’t “glisten,” I sweat like a damned Hell hound, means I don’t wear pastels. This stuff also would NOT work for cold-weather. I specifically ordered stuff for COLD weather, because I run outside.
Obviously, the stuff they sent does NOT match what I ordered
Anywho, I figured, well, at least maybe I can try it on to get an idea of the quality and how the products fit. Unfortunately, to add insult to injury, it was all in size tiny. I’m nearly 5’10, and have pretty large muscular legs and my bust is a 36C- which is why I ordered medium leggings and a large top. No way would I be able to squeeze myself into all this size SMALL stuff they sent. It was almost like they were chastising me for not being size itsy-bitsy.
Third Strike
So, after going through the seven gates of Hell to place the order, and waiting an eternity to get the order, and being utterly disappointed, I called customer service. I had to navigate a ridiculous menu that didn’t really seem to want me to talk to an actual person, but somehow I finally managed. After being on hold for a while, Liz came on.
Here’s where I messed up… I placed the order from my Hotmail account, as I usually do. I don’t like letting brands know that I’m a blogger, because then it may alter the service or products I receive. I want to be able to provide honest opinions of genuine experiences.
Well, I’d been talking about the blog post I was going to do about my run and Fabletics, since the time I placed the order. Jerry and I had discussed at length what would go into the post. Anyway, as I was accustomed to doing, I talked about my run and blog post, as I’d mentioned regularly in conversation. My mind was not working clearly because of my disappointment, along with being on meds for a sinus infection. Oh, well…
I will say that even prior to this, Liz was super-friendly, apologetic, and genuinely tried to help me. If it weren’t for Liz being awesome, I would have canceled my “VIP” membership. She even asked me about the blog, the site, etc., and thanked me for wanting to share my experience with Fabletics, which was really sweet of her.
Anywho, she said it seemed that the wrong order was sent to me and that she would re-ship. I was pretty aggravated about how long it takes for shipping, as I wanted the outfit for my run. She said she would do rush shipping, which would take 2-3 days. Although there was a good chance I wouldn’t have it in time for this particular run, at least I wouldn’t have to wait for the regular, snail-like shipping again.
Or so I thought… When the tracking was finally available on the FedEx site, it showed my order wouldn’t arrive until the end of the following week. This was NOT “rush” shipping, this was NOT the 2-3 days I was told it would take. Whoever did the shipping screwed up, but now that seems about par for the course at Fabletics. ARRRRRGGGGHHHHH…!!!! I was SEETHING. I know it shouldn’t be such a big deal- first world problems, right? But, it was just SO aggravating that problem after problem kept piling up.
So, I called customer service, navigated the menu, which kept telling me that my VIP was not active, so I would not be charged and there was nothing to cancel- which had nothing to do with my problem. I’m presuming it’s not active because I had just ordered my initial order, and it hasn’t gotten to a new month yet where I have to shop, pass, or get charged (because that’s what you have to do each month, between the short window of the 1st and 5th, as a “VIP”).
After finally saying “agent” repeatedly, the almighty Overlord-of-Fab finally allowed me to get into a queue to speak with a human, at which point I stayed on hold again, then finally spoke with Eunice. Just like Liz, Eunice was awesome, and immediately mentioned she would speak with a supervisor. She placed me on a brief hold, presumably to do just that, then came back on and did another shipment for me, after verifying what I wanted was still in stock- thank goodness it was or we would have had a whole other problem. She verified that it was, indeed, rush shipping, and processed it with me on the phone, then explained to me how to verify the shipping.
Of course, it was now Thursday late afternoon, so she did make sure to mention that even with the rush shipping, I likely would not receive the order by this weekend. Uggh. I was infuriated, but not at Eunice-at least she was genuinely trying to help, and she was honest.
So, it’s now Friday, and supposedly my order is on the way. Who knows when the order will actually arrive. I did my long run wearing Reebok, instead, along with the gear my mom and nephew got me for Christmas, and had a super run. So, many thanks to Mom, my sweetie, and Reebok, for keeping me warm in the cold winter weather!
As for Fabletics, I should mention that I think I accidentally ordered the short inseam for my tall self, so they will be more like 7/8 length than full-length. But, in hindsight, I guess that’s okay because the cold weather will be long past, and flowers blooming, by the time I receive what I ordered; and I sure as Hell don’t want to deal with the headache and torture of the exchange process with this Luciferian company. That is, if I ever actually receive it.
So far, the negatives have been: the shopping process, the poor communication with advertising “specials,” the requirement of trading one’s soul just to look at the available options, the requirement of agreeing to their “VIP” terms, the incredibly slow shipping, receiving the wrong order, the wrong order being elf-sized (no offense to Dio, RIP), customer service menu being completely irrelevant, navigating that menu and trying to speak with an actual human, hold time, and no option other than FedEx.
The positives? Liz and Eunice were awesome, it’s a good thing this company has them, or they would lose a lot more customers. I hope they can eventually get hired (at really high pay rates) by a more worthy company who actually deserves their awesomeness, so they won’t have to try to fix this crappy company’s mistakes all day, every day.
Another positive is that the clothing looks good, and they have some great designs. I have no idea of comfort or fit because I have yet to receive anything in my size to actually try on. Again, I trust Courtney’s opinion, so I’m thinking I will actually really like the items I ordered. But will they be worth the trouble I went through? Will they be worth the trip to Hell and back? We shall see- I’m keeping my fingers crossed. As for Fabletics knowing they were dealing with a blogger, and all these issues still happened, it really makes me wonder how non-bloggers are treated, and what kind of things go wrong for them…
Keep checking back, as I’ll update when (and if) I receive what I actually ordered- I’m hoping it will be worth it! Click here if you’d like to take the risk!
6 Feb 18 update: I got my order, read about it here!
Have you experienced Fabletics in any way? I’d love to hear about it- and I’m really hoping there are some positive experiences with the process so that my negatives can be balanced out. Scroll down to comment below!
*Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links.
