Let the Buyer Research

I had my doubts about the eBay  Mother-of-the-Bride dress I happened upon, but the ad guaranteed quick delivery and no greater risk than the cost of return postage. This was nowhere near the gamble taken on by the way too patient bride-to-be I had read about. She spent two months waiting for a wedding dress from ‘China Nation’ on eBay (cost: 170 pounds --  $275 U.S currency) I would have cancelled the order after a week or so and hustled to the local bridal shop. Her eBay buy  finally arrived two weeks before her wedding – wrong size, cut, material, the beading patchy and peeling.  





He designed this MOTB's dress



Too bad the hapless bride of the misbegotten gown didn’t do the kind of online research that led me to her predicament. A search term as generic as “eBay gown complaints”  directed me to a general eBay warning to stay away from copies of British gowns made in China . My gown of interest, a never worn Tadashi Shoji  design -- tags included --  would be shipped out of Kansas. The  seller had good ratings. The eBay warning  site also offered a link to an Internet guide on how to spot a fake designer label.

After I found the designer carried in Nordstroms and Bloomingdale's and checked out celebrities in his gowns, I felt ready  to take the plunge as  deep as the (almost) off-the-shoulder neckline of his 2010 gown that caught my eye. When the package arrived, three days later, I wondered if my next blog would be a yay or nay.