Le Jour Couture — Local services in Lafayette

My experience with Le Jour Couture started out great, as I had a nice shopping experience, but it quickly turned to a disaster. I told them at the fitting that I needed the dress finished for December/January for my bridal photo shoot. They assured me that it would be done with plenty of time and told me I would get a call for the estimated time frame so I could schedule my bridal shoot. I hadn’t heard from anyone for a few months so I called the store. Roxanne, the owner, told me she’d call the seamstress and get back with me. I eventually got a call back after following up SEVERAL times with no response, and was told it would be ready the week after Thanksgiving. I had to remember to call to get any type of update. Eventually an employee calls me to tell me that my dress won’t be done until the first week of January. My bridals were on the 18th of January and I’d only had one INITIAL fitting at this point. They told me the time the dresses are finished are based on your wedding date, and that it would not be fair for my dress to be pushed before others with weddings before mine. It seems they’ve never heard of bridal shoots before! Because those are normally done before the wedding.. right? The entire time I was assured my dress would be perfect, with only a few small changes if necessary. I called January 3rd and Roxanne tells me that they called, left a voicemail, and my dress was done and I had an appointment the next day at 2...an appointment I did not make nor confirm but that was the only time they did fittings supposedly...Thankfully, I had a job where I can easily take off. I never had a missed call or message from them. Well...The bodice was way too large, the strap not reinforced, and they forgot to add a bustle. Not to mention way too long. Every comment I made of what I wanted fixed was met with a rebuttal on how it couldn’t be done or that they had already fixed it. Roxanne said that was how it was supposed to fit and it was just my point of view looking at it. No apology was made for forgetting to do what I asked and the delay/stress this was causing me. I go back the next week and the bodice still did not fit and I’m told the only thing that would fix it is taping it down!!! I could grab over an inch of fabric on both sides of my chest... they also did not bustle the dress correctly like I wanted (requested it 2 times now) and they both (Roxanne and seamstress) had rebuttals about the bustle rather than doing it like I was asking. I went back to finally pick up my poorly fitting dress and paid $260 for alterations. I had to reschedule my bridal shoot and I brought my dress to Toni’s Alterations who discovered EVERY LAYER of my dress was chopped out in order to “hem” it, the horsehair fabric was chopped out, and the “hem” wasn’t even stitched. I had loose fraying layers, and the dress was nearly ruined. My bodice was completely lopsided and she had to cut out a large portion of each side to make it look proportionate. Thankfully, Ms Toni is amazing and she saved my dress... but it cost us 60% of the cost of the dress after all alterations were finished. I would never wish my experience on any bride. I never got an apology, but rather, always an excuse. The dress was and is still not perfect like they so promised me. I understand this was not technically the owner’s doing, but we contacted them several times, sent photos, and they never responded to us to make it right before posting a public review. A business owner is responsible for who they hire. Point blank. Not to mention she backed her up every step of the way. I don’t care if they have beautiful gowns, I would NEVER recommend a bride shopping there, because Roxanne obviously has no compassion or concern for...

This post/review has been 3 years in the making. I’ve been waiting for it to finally be resolved and now everything has come full circle. Here is a breakdown of my awful experience with this business. In the meantime, the business has changed names but the same people run it.

2/15/15 – I bought a Reem Acra (“Lovely Girl” Spring 2015) from Blanc Bridal Trois (now Le Jour Couture) in Lafayette, LA. I live in Houston, TX but I’m originally from the Lafayette area. A few months later, the dress arrived and we had the first fitting. Once the seamstress completed the alterations, I went in for my second fitting. The hem was completely uneven and not wearable. The seamstress was not present, only the storeowner. One side of the dress was flush with the floor and the other side was 4 inches off the ground. The storeowner told me to wear flats and to lose weight for it to work (I did not gain any weight between fittings but she said this would help the dress be lower to the ground). We left shocked and confused. After a couple days, my dad called the storeowner and told her that she would need to fix the problem. She arranged to replace the skirt (the bottom half of the dress).

10/8/2015 – The storeowner notified me that the fitting would be held on 10/11/2015 at 2PM in Lafayette.

10/11/2015: 1:45PM – we arrived at the store 1:47PM – we were told they had to move the appointment to 3PM 3PM – we were told the seamstress wouldn’t be there until 5:30PM 5:30PM – we were told they could no longer give an ETA for the seamstress because she was stuck in traffic. I then asked the employee to call the storeowner to discuss options. My wedding was in less than 2 weeks at this point (October 24th) and I had work in Houston the next day. I could not wait any longer. I discussed options with the storeowner and she told me that I could take any dress in the store I wanted or I could have a refund. I tried on 4 dresses in the store that were my size but none worked so the storeowner agreed to refund me.

10/12/2015 – We hired another seamstress to deconstruct my mother’s wedding dress for me to wear since at this point I no longer had one.

10/14/2015 – The storeowner called and said that she decided against issuing me a refund. She said that according to the contract we signed when purchasing the dress, as long as I received it prior to the wedding, they would have fulfilled their end of the contract. I recorded the phone call and in it, she admitted that she originally agreed to give me a refund.

In the end, we never got our money back. They did try to give us the dress a couple days before the wedding (with an unaltered skirt) but it was just too late – my mom’s dress was altered and ready.

I have waited this long to review/post about this because I wanted it all to be settled before. We just sold the dress at a consignment shop in Houston and recouped $647 (an 87% loss on the cost of the dress, not to mention the cost of the alteration of my mom’s dress and missed days of work).

I ended up wearing my mom’s wedding dress and it was beautiful. Looking back, I wouldn’t change that. BUT the lost hours of sleep and the many angry tears I cried during a time that is supposed to be happy and exciting were terrible.

Note: this is a VERY shortened version of the events. This is only the main part (the dishonesty and loss of money), we had so many problems with this business we consulted an attorney...

Just a few words of caution.. Make sure you call and verify your appointment, possibly more than once! After calling constantly for two days to verify my consultation someone finally called me back. My appointment was never written down, luckily (?) one was available for the same day, different time. Morgan helped me try on dresses and was fantastic! She's the only reason the store gets more than one star from me. A few months later I call the salon to make an appointment for alterations. Make the appointment for two weeks away. No problem. Shouldn't have to call and verify, right? Wrong!! I drive from Lake Charles to get to my 10:00 appointment and the store is empty. No one is there. No one is answering the phone. I ended up waiting for 2 hours!!! When someone did show up it was a girl who works in the shop. Not a seamstress. Was a seamstress ever even scheduled to meet with me? The only person I was able to get ahold of was the lady who works at the New Orleans store. I recommend anyone drive the extra miles and go there! She was polite and courteous. The owner DID call to apologize at 3 pm. Five hours after I arrived at the store. Three hours after I left without getting my dress fitted. I feel as though this was too late for an apology! There were only excuses given. I still am not clear on what the issue was. Did my appointment not get written down? There was no one at the store. Not a sales person and especially no seamstress.

In conclusion, don't bother! Save yourself time and frustration and go to a store who will respect you and appreciate...