"Coach: Overpriced and Overrated"

Last September I visited a Coach store in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I found the most amazing camel colored boots that I had ever seen. I decided to purchase them and leave them in the box until it was cool enough to start wearing them. It was December before I wore them. I stepped out of my apartment that day and cut across the grass to get to my car. This is when I realized that these boots were NOT made to wear outside at all because they were covered in dark brown spots from the dew on the grass. I ran upstairs and tried to dry them with a hairdryer, but of course the spots did not budge.

I went to Coach the next day and explained my situation. I explained that I would like to either send the boots to coach and see if they could repair the leather and waterproof the surface, or return the boots and get my money back. The sales associate had no idea what to do, so she got the manager to help me further.

The manager reached the counter and that is when my personal battle with Coach began. The first wrong thing that she said to me was that leather always spots when exposed to water and that is just a fact of life with leather products, which is untrue because I have never experienced this with any other leather product. Coach does not even sell a waterproofing agent to prevent this kind of problem. She then tried to sell me a moisturizer that would darken all of the leather to match the dark spots. But, I would have bought dark brown boots in the first place if that were what I wanted. The manager’s next bad move was when she told me that the boots looked perfectly wearable to her alluding to the fact that my problem really was not an issue at all and that I should just go on my way and be happy.

Coach puts you in a Catch-22 because if you let the product spot you will be unhappy, but if you waterproof anything you have to use a product that is not coach because they do not make a waterproofing agent. But, if you use a foreign waterproofing agent Coach is no longer responsible for anything that happens to your product thereafter because you used a foreign product on a Coach item, even if your issue has nothing to do with water damage. That to me is twisted logic and blows my mind!

The manager decides to take my boots for store credit, but I do not have my receipt. She was able to find my exact purchase in the computer, but that was not enough proof for the exchange. She then offered to order the same pair of boots and ship them to the store. But, why would I return my boots for another exact pair so that I could run into the same issues all over again? After some haggling she decided that she would not give my money back, but she would give me a full store credit. At that point I decided to agree, so I began shopping to spend my credit and be on my way. But, as I was shopping she called me to the register and told me that the boots are now actually 50% off and that she could only give me the discounted price since I had no receipt! I was so angry and I refused this and demanded a better solution.

I decided to send the boots to the “Coach Repair Center,” which does not actually repair anything they just determine if the product is repairable or not. A month later I received a letter notifying me that the boots could not be repaired, so they kept them at the repair center. In return they gave me a store credit valued at the sale price of the boots. I was so angry and wrote a letter to corporate about the situation, but still nothing was done. I am still fighting this battle that began last year, and I am not giving up! In short, from this experience I learned not to shop at Coach again and that it is overpriced and overrated!