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| Ray Ban Wayfarers. $100 on ideeli, $72 on Amazon |
I've been an ideeli member since college. You can get away with buying cheaper stuff now, but back then it was quite a luxury. I watched it grow from a single day single sale flash site to a multiple sale multiple day online shopping mall. I have been in and out of second row membership and have both been happy and disappointed with it.
You don't have to read my entire review. The quick synopsis is that I do not plan on buying anything from this site again.
Click here to read the whole thing >>>>
If you aren't familiar with ideeli, let me explain. It claims to be an exclusive flash sale site. It isn't exclusive at all. Sure maybe you know someone who gives you a special link so you can become a member, but you could also have gone there and become a member on a whim. They sell mostly women's clothes of the TJ Maxx variety with a tiny hint of Nordstroms on a good day. Every once in while they get a little Neiman Marcus on you... but don't expect that often. They also sometimes have really really expensive brands like chanel or Louis Viutton but often those items are used and still astronomically expensive. I mean, thats not SO amazing, even groupon had some Birkin bags a few days back.
The flash sale style works like this: a sale of a single brand or group lasts only a few days if not a few hours. Once they sell out of a particular item, that is it for that item (although they sometimes miraculously restock just as something sells out). The setup makes you want to hurry hurry hurry while items rapidly sell out. They used to do this for only a few items, which I think was much more fun, but now they seem to have 10 new sales opening every day. They also hammer you with emails telling you about their sales multiple times per day.
The Pros
- if you are an antisocial recluse maybe you could save yourself the a few bucks by buying your footy pajamas anonymously here. Or you could have went to amazon to make a more careful, review informed, and possibly cheaper purchase.
- its a bit fun in the beginning. Then you get hit with the crushing buyers remorse when you notice your item is cheaper on overstock, amazon, or from the brand website. Or if you notice the item doesn't fit and you've ousted the cost of shipping.
- The interface is clean, the photography excellent
- There are often sales on top of sales.
The Cons
- Shipping is 10 dollars. When you take this into account, you really aren't getting that great a deal.
- The flash sale style creates a false sense of scarcity when there really is none. They recycle the same brands over and over. Often, less liked items are even featured on thier "Red Sale" which is even more deeply discounted. Knowing that even they release sales makes you wonder if you are ever getting the best deal.
- Nothing they sell is ever in season, really. Just like items at an outlet mall, things are either the wrong season entirely or saved from a whole year previous.
- They do not have any normal sized models. All of the models are itsy bitsy, so you never have any idea of what clothes look like in a size other than 0 or 2.
- The photos never give you an idea of the quality of the item. I bought a "cotton" dress once and it was paper thin.
- They never have enough items in the most popular sizes. If you are a six or an eight, good luck.
- It is not the cheapest place to get clothing on the internet. The flash sale style makes it easy to get carried away when it is almost always cheaper on overstock.com. I have priced checked on overstock many times to find that ideeli isn't the end all be all for clothing
My Ideeli Buying Experiences
I thought it could be informative to walk you specifically through my ideeli experiences. I have bought 5 items on four separate shipping occasions from this website. Every single purchase stung, just a bit.
1) two tahari suits
2) one cotton dress
3) one black Mac and Jac dress
4) one jessica simpson dress
I still wear my tahari suits, but was dismayed to find that they were cheaper at JCpennys. That was especially disappointing since the paints were too long, slightly too large, and unhemmed. If I had bought them in the store, they would have been the right size and the store may have even done free hemming.
The cotton dress was paper thin and did not fit at all like it fit the model online. On the rail thin model, it looked like the halter top had a bashfully suggestive cut. On me, it was so revealing I might as well had not worn a shirt.
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| Jessica Simpson dress looks flattering on a thin model |
The Jessica Simpson dress just sucked. officially it was dubbed the "jessica simpson Tie-Waist Cold-Shoulder Dress" It was so bad that I have never even worn it. The material is stiff and scratchy. You want to throw it off as soon as it is on. When you sit down, all the little beads act like they are going to pop off. The material is so thick that it makes the waist look super thick especially when that 1" diameter tube they call a tie belt is strapped on. Sure, it looks lovely on the model, but I can imagine they can't sell this anywhere but online. Its made rather cheaply, and it would be a dead giveaway in person.
So you are probably thinking by now that these are the pitfalls of buying ANYTHING online. I would like to argue that this is not so. Ideeli lies to you. The models are rail thin to make unattractive cheaply made clothing look like it has thicker, more structured fabric and construction. The sizing information is cookie cutter and is never specific to the brand. There are no reviews for an item and the Q and A section of the site is highly, HIGHLY monitored. I once made a comment on a piece of clothing that was not so favorable. It was deleted. Someone else made a comment on my comment, and their comment was quickly deleted as well. As a matter of fact, a group of us had a whole conversation while the moderator was quickly trying to erase our tracks. It was upsetting how fake the community building aspect was. They later sent me a message later on twitter about. HA.
Summary
Buy at your own risk, just don't get caught up . Better deals are found elsewhere, and maybe better shopping experiences too.