Bivouac — Local services in Ann Arbor

I had previously always recommended shopping at Bivouac to anyone who needed a good place to find winter gear. However, my most recent visit left me in tears as I walked out of the store, vowing to never return. This was not my first time visiting and shopping at the store but it was the first time I was alone, before my roommate and her family had always gone with me. Almost immediately after arriving, I had an employee walk up to me and ask if I needed any help, I replied with “no, I’m just looking, thank you” but he continued to follow me pretty closely. I attempted to walk around the rack of clothes and find what I was looking for but he kept following me. I am a Latina student at UM so the immediate attitude of watching over me very closely made me feel uncomfortable and racially profiled by the employees. After going to the fitting room another male employee started watching me and asked if I had found everything I was looking for. I again replied with thanks but that I was just getting ready to pay for my items. It might be important to note that my parents were apple paying me the money for the base layers so I was waiting for that to come through. He kept telling me that he could hold my items while the money came through even though I refused many times. He told me that I could just come back tomorrow and they would hold on to my items, but I again refused. I had asked if the store was about to close soon because he gave me the impression he wanted me to get out of the store quickly but he said they closed at 8 pm and this was around 3 pm. It felt as if the employees thought I was going to steal something or I didn’t have enough money to pay for the things in my hands. I quickly walked over to the cashier, who was the only nice person I encountered at the store, paid, and ran out of the store. I will not be coming back here, I was pushed to tears, and made to feel incredibly uncomfortable and less than. I will no longer recommend the store to other students, especially to other POCs who don’t deserve to be treated like this when we spend considerable amounts...

I used to really like this place back when I was in college but my most recent experience was horrible. I went in casually browsing and ended up buying a white sweater that I thought was really cute. After I got home, I was trying on the sweater and realized that there was a makeup stain on the inside collar, and I know it definitely wasn’t from me since I normally don’t wear makeup. I went back to bivouac the next day and tried to talk to an employee to exchange it for a different one. They told me that I can’t return or exchange it since the sweater had a makeup stain, and when I tried to explain that I bought it that way, they wouldn’t believe me and refused to do an exchange. I then asked if I could get a discount since the item was damaged when I bought it, and they also refused. They basically accused me of lying about the makeup stain and wouldn’t help me at all.

Absolutely awful experience. I will never go back to this store. There are other cute stores on campus and everything here is overpriced anyway. Stay away...

If I could give this place 0 stars, I would. When I entered the store with my friend, one of the workers immediately gave us a side eye. She eventually greeted us in an unenthusiastic tone. When we were looking at the candles in the front of the store, we overheard her saying to another worker that she should “keep an eye on them.” Immediately my friend and I (both of us being people of color) realized that we were being racially profiled. As we moved along the store the worker who was asked to keep an eye on us followed us. Different workers followed us as we moved to various sections of the store. When we finally decided that we had had enough and left, we noticed that the worker who initially gave us a look said good bye to the person who left before us, but gave us a look and did not say anything to us as we left. This was our first time in the store, and I can definitely say that we will not come back after that discriminatory experience. A completely unwelcoming...