To: Harry.Bovik@k.gp.cs.cmu.edu
Subject: formal wear
Keywords: wedding
Date: Thu, 30 Jun 88 11:42:26 EDT
Message-ID: <17307.583688546@IUS1.CS.CMU.EDU>
From: Carol.Novak@IUS1.CS.CMU.EDU

If you are looking for formal wear to rent, avoid Liberty Formals.  They are 
totally incompetent at providing rentals that fit.  My story:

I bought my wedding dress at Celebrations by Liberty in the Monroeville
Mall and thought it would be handy to rent the men's clothing there as well.
The use the national chain Liberty Formals.  Well the dress was fine, 
although the sales ladies screwed up one of my fitting appointments, but 
the tuxes were a disaster.

The salesman assured us that they could get a good fit from just measurements
of the men's bodies.  I should have known better.  Out of 8 men that rented 
tuxes, only 2 had outfits that fit the day before the wedding.  My Dad
wears a 44 jacket and a 40 pants so they just got him a 42 jacket and pants.
Needless to say neither fit.  My husband has a 16.5 inch neck and they gave 
him a 15.5 inch shirt which he obviously couldn't button up.  The ushers' 
tuxes had assorted other fit problems whose details I was too frazzled
to ever find out.

"No problem," Liberty said.  "We'll just ship in replacements by Federal 
Express to arrive the morning of your wedding." 

HUGE PROBLEM when the shipment was sent to the wrong store 150 miles away.  
As you can imagine I was tearing my hair out on the day of the wedding, 
instead of trying to relax.  They ended up putting the replacements on a
commuter flight and they arrived just 1.5 hours before the wedding.  This
time they didn't taking any chances:  for my father alone they brought three
pairs of pants and two jackets for him to try.

Afterwards I wrote a letter of complaint to the store manager suggesting
at minimum a written apology to the men involved  (I enclosed their names
and addresses).  We never received a response of any kind from this
store.

I think most of the incompetence was actually by Liberty Formals, the 
national chain, so that's why I say to avoid them.  They sent tuxes that 
didn't match the measurements and they sent the Fed. Ex. package to the wrong
store.  However, the local store Celebrations by Liberty also earns my 
animosity by not apologizing for the crisis either during or afterwards.

My belief:  you pay a lot of money for your wedding clothes.  These
stores make a lot of money off of you.  You DESERVE excellent service.
If you don't get it, go elsewhere.  If you have any inkling before you buy
that the sales people are incompetent, beware!  Once you've bought, they
know they have you, because when are you going to buy/rent wedding clothes 
ever again? 

--Carol Novak