Thursday, July 31, 2014

Ashton Drake Galleries Website Review

I collect dolls. I'm 25 years old and still have a love for them. I'm not talking regular K-Bee Toys baby dolls, I'm talking expensive porcelain dolls, or vinyl baby dolls that look so real people mistake them for actual babies.
Ashton Drake Galleries has always been one of my favorite online stores when it comes to getting baby dolls for nice prices. These baby dolls are always made high quality and are actually heirlooms to be passed down for years to come. Not only that if you buy a doll now, in 5 years when they break the mold, or stop selling them the value of your doll can triple in price. Whether or not you part with your doll though is all up to you. I have one set worth thousands when originally I only spend a few hundred. I refuse to part.
Anyways, I used to always order my dolls from their mailing catalog, but when my cousin told me they had a larger selection in their online catalog I figured I would place my first online order.
On their online site they had everything I could want, dolls asleep, dolls awake, lifelike vinyl babies, porcelain baby girls and boys. Some come with accessories, and some come with spare clothing, all though come with a certificate of authenticity, and almost all of the dolls come with a birth certificate. Some people are nutty and collect them and treat them as their own; me, I just like propping them up on a shelf to give it that big jaw dropping 'AWE' when people see it.
On the site Ashton Drake also sells ornaments, and jewelery, this is a section that I had never seen in the mailing, so it was nice to see what other items Ashton had to offer besides just dolls. However I had no use for ornaments and jewelery, my only need was to view the newer dolls they had available.
You see I already had a full sized Emmy doll, and when I spotted the tiny Emmy, I had to have her. This doll was gorgeous. She was priced fairly too, at only $59.99 she could be mine. I planned on placing her right next to her sleeping big sister Emmy doll.
Ordering her was easy and all I had to do was click BUY NOW in red, underneath the doll. I gave my information, gave my credit card number, and that was it. All in all the whole check out process only took me about a minute. Now all I had to do was wait. 4-6 weeks. Sigh.
Time passed, and passed, and the 4-6 week mark had already been surpassed. It honestly took almost 2 goddamn months for my doll to come.
On the front porch sat my cardboard box done up with some maroon flowers and the Ashton Drake logo. I ripped open the box, and...and...got a goddamn train! These pieces of shiiimaccckckck sent me the wrong item!
On the phone I went, they told me to send it back, and they would replace the item with my doll. Okay! But they didn't tell me my shipping fee would be refunded, nor did they tell me they would rush deliver my doll to me. Basically like the morons over at TiVo they told me I couldn't have my doll until they received the train. Hah!
I was so pissed, I told her to refund my credit card now! I was told my card would not be refunded until they got back the train. WTF!?!?!? Are you kidding me! They send me the wrong item, and now I am responsible for sending it back, or I bought it! What's up with that.
I sent the stupid train back and even gave the jerks the tracking number, and still they would not refund me. It took 2 months to get the whole thing disputed.
It's a damn shame really, because I had ordered so many dolls from this company, and now because of this once incident will never ever again order from them. They truly need to fire whoever they have in charge of packing and shipping over there. I had never run into such rude, idiotic practices from this company before. Nor do I plan on making the same mistake twice. I instead bought my tiny Emmy doll on ebay for a lower price than they had advertised anyway.
The whole experience was a headache, a waste of time, and a disappointment.

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