I called Poffie Girls in May to book my bridal appointment for August 1st. I specifically chose Poffie Girls, because I plan to wear a nontraditional color for my wedding gown, and their website advertises beautiful pageant wear by well-known d...esigners. I explained this to the staff member who booked my appointment, and told her which designers I was most interested in seeing. She assured me they would have no problem accommodate my requests. I filled out the online questionnaires immediately after booking my appointment, and linked my Pinterest board where I’d saved all of my wedding dress ideas, as advised by the Poffie Girls staff member I spoke to on the phone. However, when I arrived for my appointment on Saturday, I was taken upstairs to a disappointing prom collection, and many of the dresses looked very dated. I saw no dresses by the designers I was looking for. I was told that the few dresses hanging there in the color I requested were all that were available to me, and nothing else could be ordered. I was shocked. I repeated to the consultant what I’d been told when booking my appointment, and her response was, “Well, I don’t know who you talked to, but this is all we have, and we can’t order anything else.” I was speechless. I felt like I had been intentionally misled by the website and the staff person who booked my appointment. My bridesmaid, a former pageant coach who drove three hours to attend the appointment with me, suggested we at least go downstairs and try on some traditional bridal gowns to get ideas for fit and style. When we went downstairs, we were ushered over to a very small collection of sale dresses, and told to put clips on those I’d like to try. None of those dresses were by any recognizable designers, and I struggled to find more than three that I was interested in trying on. While the first dress I tried did give me some good ideas regarding the best style for my body type, the rest were disappointing, and the dresses pulled by my consultant were horrible. I told my consultant I did not want ball gowns, that I preferred soft, light, flowing materials with lots of movement, and that I wanted a V neck that wasn’t too revealing. I had also put all of this information in the questionnaire. Instead, she brought back ball gowns with stiff, tulle skirts, and said it would have less volume if we took out some of the layers of tulle. She didn’t seem to understand that removing layers would not make the remaining tulle any softer or less stiff. I don’t believe she had much knowledge of fabrics at all. The last two dresses she brought were a heavy, strapless, satin ball gown, and an extremely heavy, matronly, dowdy, stiff dress made of a material that resembled some kind of upholstery. It was while I had this dress on in front of the three-way mirror that another staff member approached me and said, “Are you still thinking a color, or have we changed your mind yet?” I then realized they did not care what I wanted in a dress, and were only concerned with what they thought they could talk me into buying. I felt like I was being mocked. I was humiliated. What should have been a fun, exciting experience was utterly miserable. I was in tears in the dressing room. When I came out, my consultant suggested I try shopping at Bedazzled across the street, but Poffie Girls had successfully stolen my joy and excitement and willingness to even think about subjecting myself to another dress shopping experience.