I had a very mixed experience at Alma's a few weeks back. I enjoyed my time trying on dresses, but I was also left with a negative feeling about the overall experience.
This was my first time going to try on wedding dresses, so I did some research on yelp to find a central place for my family that was traveling from out of town (some from Chico, Granite Bay, and the Bay Area). I found Alma's and thought it would be a great place to start since she has nice dresses, but nothing too boujee, like some of the other places I saw in the Sacramento area.
I called and made an appointment about a month ahead of time, and scheduled it with Alma herself. She asked when the wedding was, what dresses I like, how many people were going to be with me, etc. Seemed like we were good to go and I was looking forward to my appointment.
We walked in right at 12 for my appointment, and I immediately knew that she wasn't expecting us by the look on her face. My heart sank because my aunt, cousins, grandma, and mom were all there and would be traveling about 4 hours that day just to be a part of the day with me. I told her I had an appointment and she said, "no! I don't have any appointments today!" I told her that we had spoken on the phone about a month ago, and I saw her check the wrong weekend on her calendar. She said she had nothing scheduled so I made sure she was looking at the right date. She flipped back a week and went "OHHHHH. Oh no. I see it. I was going to do my taxes today."
Great. My first experience trying on dresses, and I already felt that we were now an inconvenience. She said she could make it work and asked me to start picking out dresses. She had a LOT of beautiful dresses. Many different styles, cuts, etc., and a lot of the different dresses styles that I thought I might like/wanted to try on.
For the most part, Alma was helpful, would assist me in getting the dresses on, and would clip it different ways so that we could see the detail of both the front and back. The one thing that made me SO UNCOMFORTABLE is that while trying on dresses, she left the curtain open the entire time! I slid it closed a few times but she would go in & out and open it back up.... and there was a gentleman in the back! That's totally not my style and I just felt so exposed standing their naked with the curtain open.
At one point, she made a comment to me (away from my family, back in the dressing room) saying "if you know you don't like a style, don't try any more on because it's more work for me." I was floored. I had tried on ONE dress that was a little out of the range of what I thought I liked, for that very reason.... to rule out that style after actually trying it on. That made me very ready to be done and get out of there and it just was a huge bummer when I was just trying to find something I love for my wedding day.
Unfortunately it was a relief to walk out of there, and not somewhere I would recommend based on customer service. Great dresses, but a terrible experience. read more