Blick Art Materials — Attraction in Seattle

Helpful staff, familiar faces. Nice to see that some of the original Utrecht employees are still holding it down at Blik. I had a newer employee be a little short with me once. Its pretty common of young and new employees at any business, there's a huge inventory of great art supples here and most the staff are very friendly and helpful and are artists themselves. They probably do have to deal with allot of book taught art students and hobbyists that expect to be waited on hand and foot in a busy art store loaded with an enormous amount of mediums which they need to be and are for the most part knowledgeable. "Its their job" is a pretty lame complaint when you're in a store packed with mediums that take years to become familiar with and know well enough to be able to offer advice to artists trying to mix mediums and determine what is compatible and be able to think outside the box a little for artists that like to repurpose materials and use them for unconventional techniques. Everyone seemed familiar with the materials they supply if not experienced with them. This store isn't very old and they've had to staff and train allot of newbies, who often quit within the first few months like at any other business and retrain thevstaff as it turns over. In a couple more years they'll just get better IMO. I work out of DC and when I come to Seattle I need to stock up on spray paint and other materials that can only ground ship..so I'm forced to acquire allot of supplies when I arrive and need to get the most out of every purchase and buy items I can use for several different purposes to stretch my dollars and not leave behind allot of supplies I can't bring back with me. Its nice having other artists helping you rather than a bunch of underpaid teenagers that are there to work register like allot of chain stores..despite being busy the people that helped me were very patient and friendly and able to discuss their own preferences and techniques. As a self taught artist I Dont always have the proper terminology and I experiment allot. Its hard to experiment on a tight budget. My 2 visits were satisfactory and I was able to acquire about everything I needed at one store. "Street art" supplies are just starting to become more mainstream and available in fine art stores and employees are generally not very knowledgeable with their application or the products themselves at any art stores so it was nice having a couple people familiar with spray paints and newer "mainstream". mediums..prices...

I'm very disappointed with my first time TRYING to purchase with Blick. On Nov.26, I had purchased $45 worth of stuff from the site. Two days later, I see the transaction on my Paypal. Yet I have no confirmation #, nothing. I reach out to Blick customer service and they tell me that even though the charge is showing on my Paypal.. THE ORDER DIDN'T GO THROUGH. Yet, the -$45 is showing up just fine. Upon finding out I placed an order only for it to not go through, I asked the customer service rep, if they could help me place the order, I am needing to pay with PayPal. They told me they'd be happy to help me via phone or e-mail. Before I started writing an e-mail or picked up the phone, I thought it may be a good idea to double check and ask "Can I pay with Paypal if I place the order through e-mail or phone?", and they say "No, you can't pay with Paypal with e-mail or over the phone. You could pay with PayPal on our website, but I wouldn't recommend that as that portion of our website is not working properly right now."

It's Nov.29 today, and I initially placed this order on Nov.26. I'm honestly done. What a waste of time and hassle, to not even get any art supplies. Blick sucks a big d* if you ask me. They will NOT be getting any business from me. Ever.

After all this hassle, I'd MUCH rather buy through Amazon or...

I am done feeling ripped off by Blicks. Years of shady upcharges and tricky practices finally amounted to a sense of disgust that I won't be able to shake. A good business doesn't make you question if you really got a good deal on what you were searching for, and Blick's really just constantly fills me with a disgust and sticker shock. On my last visit, I learned that they price match to a post-shipping cost on their website- which means that the savings from shipping get passed onto Blick. Isn't that nice? You spend the energy going to their store, so they don't have to ship items and increase our carbon foot print-- but they're going to actually charge you more for the pleasure. I've spent thousands of dollars on blick in the last year alone, putting in tons of effort to make sure the prices were fair, but honestly I'm done. You shouldnt have to hold the hand of a business like it's that friend who just can't stop stealing from you. Staff seems over worked, un-engaged and even though they seem like artistic types clearly the corporate structure has sucked out their...