Had a bad experience shopping for your dress?

I have just recently been married and I own a bridal shop so I can see this from both points of view, but I'd like to add a different take to it if you want to know.

I'm guessing if you are writing a piece on this issue, you maybe want to look at it from different angles and perhaps not just indulge in a spot of bridal shop bashing, which goes on a lot on here.

As a bride, I know from personal experience that not all bridal shops offer good service and a good product and absolutely nothing would justify this. A lot of the complaints I see on this site from brides appear to be totally justified, and nothing excuses poor service or a faulty product.

However, I just want to throw this in as something to think of. The glossy magazines you speak of in your post do portray the dress shopping experience as something magical and hype it up into something which in reality it isn't. They discuss the idea of "perfection" as something every bride should be striving for in every aspect of her wedding day, but does "perfection" to the level they portray actually exist? Is there this mythical bridal shop where you are the only bride, where roses are scattered at your feet as you enter, that your entire party are given vintage champagne and chocolates and the owner is utterly devoted to every aspect of your wedding? Now I'm being ridiculous there, but what I mean is that a lot of the "bad bridal shop" posts I see on here are not necessarily bad bridal shops, they are often considered this way because of the bride's perceptions of what a bridal shop should be. I don't mean for one moment that we shouldn't aim high, and that standards should be anything other than top notch, but if your bridal shop won't do a 7pm appointment on a Sunday night because that's the only time you are free (for example), does it make them a bad bridal shop? No, and no other shop in the world would open up especially for you at that time on a Sunday, but because the media have filled brides with the idea that bridal shops should be dropping everything to accommodate you, brides think they're getting bad service, when they don't get what they want.

From the standpoint of a bridal shop owner, I provide an extremely good service and a quality product, and I get very few complaints because if either the service or product falls short in some way, I am the first one to have something to say about it. However, a day in my life varies hugely from the image that the bridal magazines say dress shopping should be. For example, today I had a bride in and while she was there, another group arrived without an appointment who wanted to try on dresses, but because I only have one changing room I couldn't see them and had to book them in another day. I know they weren't very happy that they couldn't try on when they expected to, but the bride who had booked had priority. They may go away and badmouth my shop, but that wasn't bad service, and there is nothing else that could be done to please them other than making the first bride leave, which of course I won't do. Someone else came in with a baby who screamed from the moment they arrived, till the moment they left. They gave the child crisps which ended up all over the floor and they pulled out lots of dresses and the shop ended up looking like a bomb had hit it. The bride I had with me seemed to be fine about it, but again, may go away and accuse me on internet forums of being a terrible shop, but is this situation my doing? I tried to keep the shop tidy for the first bride, I tried picking up all the crisps on the floor, but what could I possibly do about a screaming baby?

These are just a couple of examples of the reality of bridal shops, and this is the reality because it's what the general public make it. I would absolutely love to have crystal wine glasses to serve champagne in, but the reality is that a)they would get broken and b) the champagne would end up all over the dresses, floor and chairs, I know it would because I tried it when I first opened!! I would love to have cream settees and velvet cushions for people to sit on, but because of the many children with lollipops that come into my shop I have to have a fake leather one which will wipe clean. I would love to be open at 7pm on a Sunday night to accommodate brides who can only make it at that time, but from experience, if I did it for one bride, I would have to do it for every bride, and an inconvenient truth it might be, but I have a husband, a life and I won't let my shop run my entire life.

I recently received a complaint from a bride who had gained weight and her dress didn't fit. We would have done the fittings and worked around the weight gain, and not said anything about it, but this bride refused to accept that she had gained weight, despite the fact that I remeasured her and she had gained a total of 7 inches across bust, waist and hips. Her complaint was not so much that her dress was too small but that we didn't have a bigger size on standby "just in case". I have had brides gain weight, lose weight, fall pregnant, or have boob jobs and there is absolutely no way to tell which bride is going to do any one of those things, so to have a bigger dress on standby is just ridiculous. I know this bride has said bad things about me, but was that really a bad product, or poor service? No it wasn't, but this particular bride has got the idea from somewhere that WE are the ones who should fix this problem. Is there no duty from this grown woman who is bright and intelligent to take some responsibility for her own actions, ie the weight gain? But somewhere along the line, she appears to have developed the idea that her actions are irrelevant and that whatever the problem, it is my problem to fix it.

Anyway, I know this isn't what you wanted to hear, and may not be a popular standpoint, but it would be so refreshing to see an article which is balanced and not just indulging in the usual "my bridal shop is bad because...." that is just the norm these days. It would be great to see it written from both sides, and it would be nice to see the media and bridal magazines accept, or at least acknowledge that often they are the ones who have heightened bride's expectations to something which is unrealistic, unattainable and impractical, and to maybe give brides a little help in acknowledging that "perfect" may not actually exist to the degree they are expected to find it.