Born: Comfortable shoes, crappy customer service.
I bought Steve a pair of Born shoes last year. After about only six or seven months, the sole cracked completely in half. Maybe if I had bought a pair of cheapo-joes from some random discount store we would have just tossed them, but Borns… really, we expected more. I contacted the company, expecting that they would have us send them back for a replacement. Instead, the rep that replied to my email, Ilario Altamura, sent a form to fill out and return. The form noted that the process could take 3-5 weeks. So I completed the form, sent it back on Oct 19, 2007, and we sat back to wait. And wait, and wait, and wait.
Finally on January 4, 2008, what, like 10 weeks later?, I emailed Mr. Altamura again, asking for an update. Today is the 17th and I haven’t heard anything.
How disappointing! I wanted to like this company with their super comfortable shoes. Instead, I’m left feeling like they don’t care about their customers and that they produce a shoddy product. If they believed in their product, it seems they would have not hesitated to replace the shoe, or, at the very least reply with a reason why not.
Let’s contrast Born to a company that cares and stands by their product: LL Bean. A pair of winter boots, several years old, had soles that started disintegrate due to dry rot. LL Bean took them back, no questions asked. Because the soles shouldn’t dry rot after such a relatively short period of time, because they believe in their products, and because, most importantly, they want me to continue to purchase things from them. Which I will.
UPDATE 1/25/08: The day after my post above, I received an email with a request to call Born. Mr Altamura said he never received my form. How odd he must have thought it was that I emailed him saying “I have attached the form” and later “Do you have any information for us?” If he had emailed me with his confusion, I certainly would have promptly responded to clear things up. I emailed my form again and also called (Mr. Altamura was “on the phone or away from his desk” so I left a message. I love my caller id, too.) I guess the form got through this time because a few days later I got an email to send the shoes back for a replacement pair. Thank you Ilario Altamura!
Better late than never, I suppose. Although I could certainly have done without the drama.