About a month ago I happen to be passing by an Ashley furniture store and stopped in to look at some bedroom sets. As I entered the store I was approached by a salesperson who informed me that the store was having a late night sale and was raffling off door prizes. She asked me if I would like to signup for the raffle and so I did. I continued looking around the store and found a wonderful living room set I ended up purchasing. Meanwhile, my name was pulled in the raffle.
I was expecting a store certificate or something, maybe even a $25 cash prize.instead I was given these fine looking his and her matching gold watches. I held on to the watches while I continued looking at the beautiful furniture in the store. I finally left the store after spending about $2500 cash in furniture.
After I arrived home, I proudly took the fine gold watches and showed my wife. A closer look revealed, well, they weren't fine gold watches at all. They were fake knock-off Geneva watches, the same ones they pedal on every street corner in New York City. And to make things worst they didn't work — THE BATTERIES WERE DEAD.
The very next day I took those fine gold watches back to Ashley in hopes of receiving something else in exchange for the fine gold watches. After all it was a raffle, surely they would have something to replace them with. I figured since I had just spent about $2500 cash things should go nicely. Well, not at all.
I spoke to one salesman and showed him the watches, he pointed me to a saleswoman who in turn pointed me to yet another saleswoman.
They all got a big chuckle out of the watches. While I waited patiently, about 20 minutes, a guy who I recognized from the night before, a maintenance guy & not a salesperson, brought me a watch, a faded watch, a watch with a dull plastic face, not even in a box. I asked the guy was he crazy and requested to speak to the store manager whose name I was never given. I was told she was in a meeting.
Finally after about 20 minutes, yet another saleswoman came over to inform me that they were checking to see if they had any more of the watches laying around. I informed her that I did not want the watches since it was likely that what ever they found would either be old and used or simply more knock-offs. I again asked to speak to the store manager. Again the saleswoman returned, acting as liaison between the manager and I, she again tried to get me to leave the watches and return at some other time when they might have more door prizes. I informed her that I didn't bite and that I found it insulting that a manager of a store in which I had just spent $2500 cash wouldn't come out to speak with me face-to-face. I asked the saleswoman to see if her manager would agree to perhaps a store coupon that I could apply to a new store purchase.
Again the saleswoman returned without her manager to tell me they will likely be getting in more door prizes and they will call me when that happens so that I may come in and exchange the fake fine gold watches. It finally clicked in me that this manager was not interested in rectifying this matter and was not remotely concerned about acquiring and maintaining customers. Obviously customer satisfaction was not part of the store's mission.
I simply asked for my fake watches and I left with the intentions on never shopping at that store again. It's not that I lost any money on the watches, it was the whole principle of Ashley HomeStore giving away fake-nonworking watches to attract customers. I was going to buy the furniture regardless. Needless to say I never received a call from the store and it took three weeks for them to deliver the items that I had purchased. Two items I had to refuse delivery due to the items being severely unbalanced. Two items I did sign for had wood parts that were splintered but I figured I could repair. The table top was scuffed in three different areas and a three inch scratch in another. I am still waiting for the replacements of the two items I refused. One question, Where is the quality assurance?
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