Red Carpet Box

[MissLindaJean]

The issues seem to stem around expired products and questioning whether they're cheap eBay wholesale lots as opposed to expectations from the business promised to and didn't deliver. What private details being commented on come from posts and messages received and threats from the business owner herself. Having money, a lawyer, tortious whatever... Coming from the business owner, again. No. of children, having an ailment..coming from the business owner's friend. Consumers don't care. We don't need to know these details. What we need is to receive goods as promised or get compensation. Otherwise, we feel duped and scammed. Or at least make some effort to rectify matters. Which isn't happening. You are not helping the business and its owner by putting out personal info on them. Maybe they'll sue you , too?

 

[kawaiimeows]

Originally Posted by mamamultimedia /img/forum/go_quote.gif

It is pretty obvious that I won't be changing any minds of folks who are trying to get free product or perhaps have hidden interests that the group is unaware of.  I just hope that paypal settles your disputes fairly.  However, I hope after red carpet box is running more smoothly, that some of you who are just watching all of this go down will remember this conversation and give it a try.  Patricia is a good person, working for a good cause, and her product and service will see this business through. 

stop trying to act like members here are filing paypal disputes to get free goods. most people who know a thing or two about makeup wouldn't take expired makeup even if you were giving it away for free. i'm not going to put just anything that came from ebay on my face.

paypal, often times, in the cases of counterfeit items, tells the buyer to just destroy the item rather than sending it back, just to ensure that it won't go back out in to the marketplace. so if paypal tells these customers to do that this time, trust me, it won't be because these girls were trying to get free makeup, but because it will ensure that the owner won't try to pass it off to any more of her unsuspecting customers.

 

[mamamultimedia]

@Zadidoll - I don't blame Patricia for losing patience with people who are trying to get product for free.  The only reason that she brought up money was so that people would understand that she had the resources to defend herself if necessary.

 

[Dalylah]

Mama, while it is terrible that anyone has any illness, especially cancer, I have to agree with some of the ladies who spoke earlier. If she was very ill she shouldn't be launching a business. If something happened suddenly she should have refunded their money with an apology and an explanation and let things be. I think most of the ladies here would have found that more than acceptable.

What is not acceptable is the deception and false advertising that may have potentially happened. Showing one item and then not including it or replacing with a lesser item (without the consumer's notice) at all is a scam. If I were to purchase a gift box of items from any major beauty company and found that something was missing I would let them know and 99% of them would exchange or replace the missing box at their cost. That's just how customer service goes. So while she is a human, she is a business to us and we expect to be sold things in an honest manner.

If she truly does have cancer then my heart and healing thoughts go out to her. It still doesn't excuse bad business practice.

 

[mamamultimedia]

@kawaiimeows - i do think that some people on here are trying to get product for free - so I will in fact continue stating that.  my products were legitimate, and though some were discontinued - were not expired.  

 

[kawaiimeows]

Originally Posted by mamamultimedia /img/forum/go_quote.gif

my products were legitimate, and though some were discontinued - were not expired.  

hi patty?

also there was a clear expiration date of October 2011 on the stila product in dioradora's video.

 

[kawaiisquawks]

I've been following this thread with some interest since the very beginning and I have to say I'm very glad I did not sign up. I'm all about supporting small businesses, but as with ANY business, large or small, I expect them to at least own up to any mistakes made. Honestly, I would have been more than willing to give this service a chance in a later month had the problems from this first wave of boxes been handled properly and maturely. Mistakes happen. It's part of life's experience. Deleting your customer's comments, blocking them, and threatening them with legal action is hardly the way to retain or bring in new customers.

Quote: Originally Posted by mamamultimedia /img/forum/go_quote.gif

I guess that I can understand it if some folks were not satisfied with their products - maybe you didn't like the styles, or cosmetic choices and that is a legitimate topic for this forum.  However, getting products that you don't care for is the risk you take with any subscription service.

Yes, getting products you don't care for is a risk with subscription services. However, receiving EXPIRED makeup items should not be part of that "risk." I'm even willing to believe that she truly did not realise the products were expired - hell, I don't throw out some products when they're past their dates, BUT I would not be very happy if what I purchased was already expired. And some of the products had been discontinued for over 2 years? A quick google search before even purchasing the items to be included in the boxes would have prevented this entire situation...

Quote: Originally Posted by mamamultimedia /img/forum/go_quote.gif

and is actually battling a brain tumor (she is waiting to find out whether it is cancerous or not). If you would like to learn more about her personal journey with her pituitary tumor feel free to visit her facebook page that she made to document her journey:  https://www.facebook.com/PituitaryTumorsAdenomasAPersonalAndPublicJourney.

Personal lives really don't matter in business. It may sound harsh, but it's the truth. It seems that everyone has a sob story or excuse when they don't perform to their best. Maybe if more time and effort were involved, there wouldn't be any problems. You don't earn success or respect by avoiding responsibility. In fact, most of the people I know that have had to face major barriers at some point in their lives have only worked harder than before and never expected anybody to treat them any differently.

(Correct me if I'm mistaken - I am NOT a medical student of any type, just a senior in engineering, but half my family is in the medical field, so I have a slightly larger knowledge of medicine than the average person - aren't adenomas benign by definition? They do need to be monitored to make sure they don't grow or become cancerous, but it's a heck of a lot better than being diagnosed with a cancerous tumour right off the bat, especially when most of them never do progress in any way).

Quote: Originally Posted by mamamultimedia /img/forum/go_quote.gif

@kawaiimeows - i do think that some people on here are trying to get product for free - so I will in fact continue stating that.  my products were legitimate, and though some were discontinued - were not expired.  

 

My? 

 

[Beautymomma]

After something has been discontinued for so long it's no longer useable. The Avon liner was discontinued in 2009 liner has a shelf life of 2 years which means it is in fact expired. She should have also posted to her customers to check their items apon finding out that some people if not all got expired items but she didn't which makes her liable if someone had some sort of skin irritation & finds out she knew they were expired or discontinued for several years.

 

[mamamultimedia]

@kawaiimeows - Yep, "my".  Do you have a problem with my wording?  I am also a customer, and paid $25 to get a box.  Geez.

@daylah - Thank you for having the decency to reply without being totally rude and mean.  I completely agree with everything that you are saying.   While I am admittedly Patty's friend, I am also a customer.  I got a box just like everyone else's and I got exactly what she advertised.  She showed pictures of product and let people know what she was sending before it even went out.  The one change that she had to make (she couldn't send the purse because of the size of the box), she informed people before the packages ever went out (with plenty of time for people to cancel their order).  And yes, I totally agree with you and everyone else -  illness does not justify bad business!  I will restate that the reason I shared her personal information with this forum was so that people would better understand her intentions and be aware that she is coming from a good place.  

I am done with all this.  I feel sad for my friend to have to deal with such a community which seems to have somewhat ganged up on her, but I am also aware that this is a small fish bowl in a large ocean.  It seems that the only problems that she has had have come from this group.  I do hope that paypal sorts out any disputes fairly, and that both parties learn whatever lessons they need to learn from all of this, and that my friend's business goes on to be successful.  

 

 

[lunadust]

Patty, either way we know that you are reading this. I wish you good health and that it turns out okay. That said it really has nothing to do with this. It just becomes an excuse. 

What you need to do before sending out any more boxes:

-Find out what makeup is expired and throw it out or give it away to friends. 

-Earrings are probably not from a trustworthy place and contain either loads of nickel and lead. I wouldn't send them out. boxes could probably be re-used though. 

-Figure out if the sunglasses are authentic. I'm sure you know selling counterfeit goods is illegal. 

-Depersonalize your business. Take your personal life out of it including your pictures.Get a professional to make your webpage. Look at other facebook pages for boxes and see how they respond to complaints. 

-You named it red carpet box. Find a business that can make boxes for your company that are red to ship in. Not buying a lot of red boxes off ebay or using construction paper.

-Design a logo and use your own pictures for your business and of your own box. I think someone had sent you a gift and you used that as your cover photo? Not right, its not from your business.

-DO NOT SEND OUT any more boxes until you've figured this out! You need to come up with a plan for shipping too. A timeline each month. Even well established boxes get an angry mob if they ship late.

If you don't take our advice, it's on you.

 

[kawaiimeows]

Originally Posted by mamamultimedia /img/forum/go_quote.gif

@kawaiimeows - Yep, "my".  Do you have a problem with my wording?  I am also a customer, and paid $25 to get a box.  Geez.

my mistake, i interpreted your wording as implying that you were patty, speaking about her own products as a whole.

so, just because your products weren't expired (so you believe) doesn't mean that other peoples' weren't. like i said before, dioradora's video clearly shows an expiration date of October 2011 on the stila, and the shelf life is almost up on the long ago discontinued avon product. in addition, that's clear by their rock bottom prices on ebay.

you're being incredibly hostile about this, making everyone here out to be bad guys.

you might be a customer, but you're also clearly a close friend with a bias.

 

[Beautymomma]

I'm just thankful for threads like these that owners can't delete so when people want to check into it this pops up on google as one of the first listings & people can be well informed before purchasing since the owner deletes any bad feed back even if it is constructive.

 

[Rach212]

Originally Posted by calexxia /img/forum/go_quote.gif

Then she's an idiot and should have waited until she had the products in hand before hyping up the product; I'm not "anti living room" as some are, HOWEVER, it still seems to me that if you're GOING to do a "living room box", you definitely should have at least the first three months' products lined up and in hand before publicizing.

Oh I totally agree - I hope I didn't sound like I was defending her.  I meant that it sounded like she just ordered based on the "QVC quality" description and had no idea what was going to bed in the shipment!

 

[Rach212]

Originally Posted by bluelion /img/forum/go_quote.gif

I just saw a recent post where she said (paraphrased) that she'd agree that the earrings aren't worth $80 after opening them. That concerns me as a potential consumer even more. Why wouldn't you take the time to check the products that are supposedly carefully chosen to be in the boxes? It's great if she's filing a dispute with these wholesalers, but it's an error that wouldn't have happened in the first place if she'd checked the merchandise to start.

Just wanted to add that I'm glad she seems to be taking accountability now, and I hope she is trying to rectify things with disappointed customers and hopefully doing everything in her power to improve her business if she intends to keep on going.

She sure thought those same earrings were wonderful when she was going through them all before she shipped the packages out!  She was raving about all of them and what a great item they were when she posted a photo of one pair on the Facebook page. 

Like many others on here ...  I think this woman is in over her head and not handling it well.  Maybe her husband the successful businessman can give her some advice on how to talk to people, especially people who are/were customers and buying her product.  I would be fired if I acted toward customers like she has. 

 

[zadidoll]

Originally Posted by mamamultimedia /img/forum/go_quote.gif

@Zadidoll - I don't blame Patricia for losing patience with people who are trying to get product for free.  The only reason that she brought up money was so that people would understand that she had the resources to defend herself if necessary.

You're under the impression that the members who have complained are trying to scam her for free products. Why can't you believe that the products she sent them is expired and is discontinued? Would you honestly pay for an expired or discontinued product if you were under the impression it's new? 

Let me give you an example of good business versus bad business.

GOOD BUSINESS

A few months ago, earlier this year, Birchbox sent out a BeFine products that contained SPF. The expiration date on the packages dated, I think, between 2009 and 2011. People posted about it here on MUT and posted pictures of their expired products. More and more people came forward. I contacted Birchbox and encouraged others to do the same thing. I also contact BeFine about it. Birchbox's response was to give those affected (14 box combinations out of 32 box combinations sent out) 100 points credited to their accounts. That was the equivalent to a refund. That satisfied many of Birchbox's members but others decided to request refunds and some cancelled their accounts with Birchbox.

BeFine's response was to issue those either free samples or a discount on their website. I had the chance to interview their marketing manager in regards to the situation to get their take on the matter and he was very pleasant and apologetic about it.

Of course there is MyGlam/Ipsy who had severe issues with shipping in January and February along with customers missing products among so many other things. Instead of threatening to sue people they worked with us bloggers and listened to their customers to improve their bags and the products in their bags. They continue to listen to their customers and take the good, the bad and the ugly comments to improve their business. Granted, many people are still skeptical about them and I don't blame them because they have the right to be skeptical as it's their opinion but again you don't see MyGlam/Ipsy staff going around threatening people with lawsuits. Personally I'm VERY happy with MyGlam now and earlier this year I was not.

BAD BUSINESS

Another company - similar to your friends - was buying products off EBay yet made all kinds of claims. Her representative, much like how you're here essentially representing Patricia, made similar claims out Gina/Silver (can't recall the owner's name) has cancer or had cancer, had an autistic son and other things when people were complaining about getting counterfeit items, expired items and discontinued items.

That lady also attempted to issue a cease and desist to get us (MUT staff) to pull that thread down because it was destroying her business (much like Patricia's claim). She even went after Sephora before someone asked a Sephora rep if Sephora participated in subscription services to which the answer was essentially no. Like your friend, she bought items off EBay but in her case she made the claim that she was working directly with the companies in questions such as MAC. MAC doesn't work with anyone other than Macy's and don't sell on discounted sites or sell wholesale. The more she tried to shut people up the more people - including myself - looked into what she had posted on her website and on Facebook.

Another thing Silver/Gina did was use images from Glossybox and other people's photos to pass off as her Posh Pods. In your friends case she had been using images from Colourbox and Shutterbox without having a license. She forwarded me the email response to Colourbox who merely requested that she not use their images without a license. That email was a long rant instead of a simple, "I'm sorry. I'll remove the images as soon as possible."

Then there was Box Monthly and how she sent out products that were dirty, appeared to be used (as in from her own Birchboxes) and damaged.

And of course there was GoGo Girlfriend who continued to charge people despite people canceling their accounts. Thankfully I listened to my gut on that and cancelled after my first box with them because I couldn't get over the dollar store feel with the products.

 

[MissLindaJean]

My apologies, you misunderstood.. cancer, tumors, ailments and diseases are no joke. I speak from firsthand knowledge. Maybe I was too harsh in the commentary, but I don't think anyone appreciates using an ailment or claiming to be charity oriented as a means to push your business ahead. Clarifying, the karma was referencing the business, not personal issues this Patty person is going through. I'm callous, but not that big of an a hole. But that has no bearing on a company sending products that are expired and not safe for use. That's not exemplary of a good business standard and is subpar. I was thisclose to getting a box and am glad I passed. That's me and my opinion.

 

[nelliebelle1197]

And the private messages on Facebook. Talk about bad karma. Your friend really shouldn't be stockpiling so much bad karma in her situation.

Originally Posted by zadidoll /img/forum/go_quote.gif


You should ask your friend Patty to show you the emails she sent out to people over the last three days.

 

[Honicakes]

I have been watching this thread for days and I think it is time I broke my silence.  I am the reviewer that posted a great "unboxing" when I first received this box.  I stayed quiet at first (despite being disappointed at the bad products I received) to give the business a chance to rectify things.  Unfortunately - they were not.  That being said - I would like to say a few things now. 

1. I did post an update to my original review regarding the expired products.  This is inexcusable and the fact that Patty is trying to put lipstick on a pig by calling them "discontinued" is insulting to her customers.  Whether or not a product is discontinued it has a certain shelf life - an amount of time that it is considered safe to use by the FDA.  This is why many products (even if they haven't been discontinued) are REMOVED from store shelves.  They are not safe for use period. 

2. To add insult to injury, Patty was/is requiring her customers to PAY to ship back bad merchandise to then hopefully receive a replacement product.  This is just a horrible business model.  It is one thing to request the customer pay to send back something that they just didn't like - but expired cosmetics is equivalent to getting a broken vase - it is worthless.  Why should the customer be out additional money to return something that has no value? It was the businesses error that the customer received a worthless product - in this case the business clearly did not check the merchandise carefully before sending it out.  Additionally - why would the customer want to risk getting a "replacement" that is likely to be bad as well?  If anything, the business should be willing to at least give a partial refund or replace with a non cosmetic item (which removes the risk of the expired cosmetics being a replacement).

3. As the confidence in this business has already been broken (by the expired & outdated cosmetics) the customers are doubting the quality of the rest of the merchandise (and with good reason).  Based on solid research - there is a preponderance of evidence that other items included in this box were illegitimate.  The business promised Betsey Johnson or Big Buddha sunglasses.  Many of the sunglasses received were not even stamped with a logo by one of these designers.  Additionally, those that were, do not match the correct specifications of a true designer item (the labels are incorrect etc).  Also, the business itself initially stated that the earrings were QVC earrings (NOT QVC Quality - which is a huge difference) and were valued at $80.  The business has now even admitted that the earrings could not be valued at that price and has now said that they are valued at $10.  While it is good that the business is taking SOME responsibility here - that does not help the original customers who were promised a box valued at $100.  This is a clear example of misrepresentation of goods. 

For Patty - and Patty's friends - I suggest you take off the blinders and stop making excuses and saying that people are ganging up on her.  These people have legitimate complaints with this business and its practices especially considering that the business has refused to communicate them to work out a resolution.  It has been said before and I am sure it will be said again - this is NOT personal.  This is business.  It is a hard lesson to learn - but one that must be learned by any successful businessperson.  At the end of the day - do right by your customers and they will do right by you.  

(sorry that this was so long - I know a lot of this has been said already but I had to get it off my chest)

 

[tinkerbll695]

The Borghese nail polish sells for $3-$5, I wonder what the equivalent value purses that were replaced look like...

 

[classybroad]

WOW! Just read this whole thread. So sorry for all the ladies who lost $25 on expired goods. Anyone contact and get a response from paypal yet?