Pottery Barn

On August 27,2021, at 2:38am, I placed an online order for a backpack bundle with Pottery Barn Kids. My 7 year old son didn't want a backpack with dinosaurs, he wanted something else. The order was scheduled to ship Sept 12-14, two weeks from now. I called customer service on the same day to cancel the order at 10:35am (8 hours later) August 27,2021 and I was told the order could not be cancelled because it was being personalized. I called the Pottery Barn main customer service number and I was told the product was already created and ready to ship. Yet, the scheduled shipping date is two weeks from now. I spent over one hour on the phone trying to cancel this order. I have already lost more time then this order is worth.

I find it hard to believe that Pottery Barn does not have the ability to cancel an order that is cancelled within 8 hours of being placed when the shipping date is two weeks away. This is the worst company I have ever dealt with. Pottery Barn are a scam operation and their customer service is full of professional liars!

I originally ordered a Buchanan sofa from PB in November 2018. After 6 weeks, sofa was delivered in December but it was wrong model. Pottery Barn advised to keep it, until the correct one was delivered, another 6 weeks later. No real apology, like this is something they do all the time.

During the time, I decided to keep the incorrect sofa as well. I called and after waiting for ever, they told me I was a loud to buy a second sofa, being that I had bought it with a discount originally. I thought to myself, they are really going to try to sell this coach to someone after my family has used it for weeks?

In February, I was told the correct sofa was finished and would be delivered. To my surprise, they delivered the WRONG SOFA AGAIN! Delivery staff called from my house to let them know, they said someone would be in touch that same day to fix the gross mistake.

No one got back to me, and to this day I just keep getting emails when I reach out saying they are handling the situation with the manufacturer.

It has been 5 months since the order was originally placed and 2 sofas later, we cannot get what we originally ordered. There has been multiple mistakes along the way with various employees and no one is making themselves responsable. From the first error, getting in touch with someone to help us is merely impossible. The phone wait times are unspeakable. It took over 30 minutes to speak to someone in furniture and after a 45 minute call, we still had no solution. This has happened multiple times.

They keep saying a supervisor is handling the situation and that someone would call back. I never received the call. I've had to speak to agents that were rude, agents that seemed to not know what they are doing. It was been torturous.

This is not the first time that we've had an issue with a PB order, but it sure will be the last. We are changing to a furniture company that appreciates their costumers and are not too busy to make things right after they make a mistake.

At this point we have yet to receive a sincere apology or a simple gesture to make things better. A real shame!

I ordered 2,8' Chesterfield Sofas. Soon after the sofas were delivered I noticed that I was constantly trying to recreate the pleats on the top of both sofas.
This is part of the email I sent to the salesperson that helped us spend our money.

"... The sofas are comfortable and fit our living room nicely. Unfortunately less than the minimum fabric was used to hold the tuft/pleat/fold. It is the same problem on both sofas. It's a constant struggle to keep the tufts folded and, finally, I thought to contact you."

I was told my issue would be referred to their 'Platinum team'.
Five weeks later, I received this response:
"... finally heard back from the factory and Pottery Barn said the issue fell within the standards of what is acceptable and will not be rectified."

As a programmer I would love to tell end users that the program I wrote was sufficient and would not be updated; 'Nice work if you can get it'.
$3500. 00 is a lot of money to me. I thought I had researched brands before making my final decision but I was wrong.

I will no longer spend my money at Pottery Barn and recommend that everyone else find a company that values customer satisfaction.

I have been a Pottery Barn (and PB Teen/kids) account holder for a long time now.
First off: Pottery Barn eliminated their customer review of items feature a few years ago. I think that I know why.
The quality of the things they sell seems to have gone down, overall. Various issues like tarnished mirrors, poorly made linens, etc. I have received and returned several items that seemed to be of considerably less quality than, say, Target. Not everything, but definitely a noticeable and declining focus on quality.
I DO like their personalization options... however, I ordered a personalized item for Christmas last year that arrived with a completely wrong name, and was refunded only part of the cost and none of the shipping cost. Because of the overall quality of the actual item, i declined their offer to send another with the correct name.

Pottery Barn Teen has a wholly different web site and sign in process, which I find quite odd. They do, however, honor the same credit card & bonus system.

Unlike so many of the other reviewers, I have no complaints with their customer service agents. All have been polite, expressed what sounded like a true desire to assist, and they are Americans who speak English clearly. That goes a very long way in my book. There is just so much that they can do, however.
The 10% coupon towards a future purchase that you receive at each $250 interval sounds nice, but when you consider the often quite elevated price you are paying, it really isn't a benefit. Also, they expire relatively quickly and you must have a hard copy of the coupon in order to use it. (Unless there is some magic link that I havent found... but if so it is very elusive)
You are charged the full price at purchase and instructed that your coupon will be reflected on your bill later.
Their billing and payment system seems quite out dated for such a large company.

Overall, I would say that they do still carry some nice items but you are on your own with discerning which items aren't sub-par and should be aware of exact refund policies before ordering. Those policies can vary by the item, so proceed carefully.

I am not closing my account just yet. Hopefully they will listen and improve. They used to be so reliably good!

So we bought a couch September 4th and as it's a custom couch it was to take 8-10 weeks to get to us, and we thought "ok, a little pricey but worth the wait".
The 10th week elapses and I follow up with polite questions asking why nobody has contacted me, but I am assured by both the Short Hills Mall store and the Fulfillment center that it is in production but a little delayed, even though I had to contact them to find this out we stayed calm. Thanksgiving was coming up so I again contacted the store who passed me directly to the center so Pottery Barn could tell me it was still being built (this turned out to be a lie).
After thanksgiving (13 weeks after purchase) I once again contacted the Short Hills mall store who told me it was ready to be delivered and was surprised nobody had contacted me, but once again gave me the number of the fulfillment center to check the status. The fulfillment center told me that there had been a delay by the manufacturer but they couldn't tell me when I would get the couch. I asked to speak to a supervisor and after a delay the supervisor told me the exact same thing, they couldn't tell me when the couch would arrive but in their experience it would be minimum 2 more weeks (she changed this while talking to me to 4 weeks minimum during conversation). She then started saying I had a choice whether to have the couch or not, which surprised me seeing as I thought I was a customer who had waited patiently for a service and not a guy standing on the side of the road hailing a cab.
So basically we are 13 weeks in with no couch and absolutely no idea when we might receive it, but more importantly we are dealing with a company who clearly
Doesn't care that we spent our real hard earned money at their store.
If you can't walk out of the store with the product then order the product elsewhere.

I placed several orders (in the $1,000s++) in October and all of the time lines for my pieces were on target for us to receive them when we got into our new house and welcomed our family for the holidays. Four weeks after I placed my order i got my first call from PB Logistics that the chairs I ordered are discontinued and Pottery Barn did not offer any replacement options. Then 5 weeks after I placed my order I got an email that they had issues with my kitchen table and now they are expecting it to get to me by mid February and again they did not offer any replacement options. Then yesterday I got a call that my two couches and bed frame were shipped out last week and my credit card was of course charged - YET - when the truck arrived to NC they only had slipcovers - NO couches - and the bed frame did not have any sideboards or mattress slats! They went on to say that my couches would not be available now until mid March! What? Now my family is coming for Christmas and I am borrowing furniture from friends - getting fold out chairs... unacceptable and they offer NO solutions - they charged my card and when I try to get a hold of a supervisor to help I am typically on hold for 30-35 minutes each time... how does this company stay in business?

Another one star Pottery Barn review! I have ordered a lot of stuff from them lately but the bed was the first that required delivery. After waiting several months, the day finally arrived. Pottery Barn showed up, looked at my bedroom and told me they could not move the existing bed to put the new bed in place. You'd think that would have been a nice thing to tell me BEFORE they showed up, wouldn't you? But no. I went back through the emails I received. Nothing. And this is their supposedly "White Glove" delivery that I paid $249 for! So there's a long time of waiting while they consult up the chain, and finally somebody calls me to tell me that, because of "liability" they can't move anything in my house. Apparently this is a liability that only Pottery Barn knows about, because every other furniture delivery I have received has had no problem dealing with the existing furniture. And apparently they have never heard of liability waivers. The customer service person also told me that this has never been a problem before, and every other customer seems to magically know that they won't lift a finger to deal with existing furniture. So these two big strong men are standing there looking a me, a woman who lives alone, and telling me I have to move this enormous bed BY MYSELF. They wound up leaving the bed in my garage, while I work through the labor shortage and try to find somebody to dismantle my existing bed. And then, to add insult to injury, they made me sign a form that said that I declined set up. I'm SO done with Pottery Barn!

My Pottery Barn experience has been miserable. I ordered a set of outdoor porch furniture. Each took nearly 30 minutes to assemble, luckily I had the right tools, pity a person without a ratchet driver for the Allen wrenches. Two of the receiving nuts on two of the chairs were sunk in too deep so could not set the screw. Pottery Barn was unwilling or unable to send just the replacement parts, wanted me to dissassemble and return entire chairs - huge task, wasteful. I jerry rigged them instead. Then, Pottery Barn sent 4 sets of cushions for one chair. I had to repackage, because their packaging had fallen apart before arrival, and send back three sets of cushions. Pottery Barn wouldn't allow me to have UPS pick up, I had to borrow a bigger vehicle to get the big boxes to the UPS store. Then, they only refunded two of the three. I have had 6 or 7 conversations with customer service through all of this. Each has taken 10-20 minutes, and I still haven't received a full refund for the cushions I returned. Every single step of the process was time consuming and unsatisfactory.

I recently made 2 separate online orders totaling $608. I have a Pottery Barn credit card which has rewards and special financing. Pottery Barn have special financing for orders $750 and over. I called customer service to see if they could combine the orders to apply the special financing. I was told THAT IF I MADE ANOTHER PURCHASE TO HAVE IT TOTAL OUT TO $750 they would apply the special financing. Thats exactly what I did and when I called back I was informed that it couldnt be done. I was told I would speak with a manager to try to resolve it. The manager told me I could cancel everything and repurchase the merchandise. I then asked if my coupon would be applied once the new transaction was done and she said No. That I would be benefiting from the special financing. I told her I wanted my coupon to be applied and special financing since if I would have made the purchase all together and used my coupon I would still be able to use my credit card. This made me very upset and disappointed that they wouldnt accommodate the mistake that was done on there part. I wanted to cancel the whole order, which she told me I could. I spoke with someone else and was told I couldnt cancel the order, but only one item that was on the order. Ive been provided with misleading information from the beginning. Now I have to receive the merchandise and then return it once it arrives. Im so disappointed.

Was very disappointed in the sales person at the Winter Park Pottery Barn. We bought a couch and were told by the sales person that we would get key rewards points for the purchase of the couch. This was one of the reasons why we bought the couch on that day (great false sales technique). Pottery Barn only care about the sale. The salesperson even said that when you come back I will help you pick out through pillows with your key rewards. The couch was $3,500 and when I reached out to the key rewards to ask why I did not get my points (who the sales person signed me up for) they told me that I was not eligible. What a joke and a horrible sales experience. I will never go back to the Pottery Barn in Winter Park again. I would think that it might have been an error by the salesperson that I could excuse, but the sales person had explained that they have worked at multiple locations for many years. Sleazy Sales techniques and the company does not care. Pottery Barn, Shame on you for false advertisement.

Michael

I have purchased many items from Pottery Barn and in the past (2015- early 2016) any issues were handled quickly and effectively. Unfortunately my latest delivery/customer service experience has been ridiculous. On 7/21/17 I had a large order delivered to my home. The delivery men were very pleasant. After Pottery Barn left I realized that the front corner of my sectional was sliced (probably occurred when they were cutting off the shipping wrap). I immediately called the concierge service with whom I had been working with for this order. I sent pictures/email as requested. Since that day Pottery Barn has NEVER contacted me- I have reached out to Pottery Barn 6 times since my initial report. On the 4th call I also reported that one of the back pillows on my PB comfort sectional was coming apart and again I sent photos. During my last call (8/23/17) I spoke to Michael in your Delivery "QUALITY TEAM" and he assured me that he would be in touch in a couple days. He also stated that the sectional would not simply be swapped out/replaced (as I was previously told) but repaired instead. He stated that the repair team would pick up the piece of sectional, repair it at their shop and return it at a later date. Which means no sofa to sit on and another day off from work to wait for a delivery. Today is 9/6/17 and NO ONE has contacted me- RIDICULOUS!

We have been long-standing PB customers but have recently noticed a troubling gap in competence due to a poor link between PB's stores and online/corporate operations. My wife and I bought the Comfort Roll Arm Slip Covered Sofa sofa for our living room several months ago and were talked into a certain fabric and color by a Burlington, MA sales associate who assured us it was a classic material/color that PB always carried. We recently went to order a matching love seat only to find out that Pottery Barn have stopped carrying the fabric we were talked into. When this was raised with customer service, they responded by suggesting fabrics and colors that would be the "closest match" to what we already have (I doubt having 2 pieces of furniture in ALMOST the same color is a winning interior design philosophy). We now have the choice between having two couches in our living room with slightly different colors, or spending north of $500 on a matching (non-returnable) slip cover for the sofa. There is little incentive at this point to continue considering the matching love seat or shopping at PB in the future.

It has been 41/2 months and I have not gotten my order from this place! Pottery Barn take your money but you do not get what you ordered! They placed a delivery date and I took off work. That day of the delivery I get a email saying it was returned? Then another date was placed! I take off another day of work. NO DELIVERY! They will give you some BS on COVID or something else! It is like you got robbed! No new delivery date on my order still! They will send another BS email or write on this saying SO SORRY! WE WILL GET ON IT AS SOON AS WE CAN!?!?!? So I have to take off another day of work and you can not do this with the way things are now! Look at all these people not getting what they ordered! SOMEONE NEEDS TO GET FIRED THAT IS HANDLING THIS! Or this is the way Pottery Barn treats their customers! Never in my life have I been treated so bad ordering online! THIS PLACE IS A CROOKED PLACE! You don't post something on line for sale and don't have the product you are selling! I WILL BE WRITING THE BETTER BUSINESS BUREAU ON THIS AND WHO AND HOW I WAS TREATED! ""((( IF YOU ARE WRITING ABOUT HOW BAD YOU HAVE BEEN TREATED AND NOT GETTING WHAT YOU ORDERED?!?!))"" I advise you to do the same! Stop this scam and taken your money and not getting what you ordered and given some BS on their mess up! PEOPLE NEED TO BE FIRED AND GET IT RIGHT!

I placed an order for a pair of bookends that took three months to arrive broken. Cast iron was clean snapped off at the base. The pieces weren't in the box which meant Pottery Barn shipped it broken from the warehouse. They offered me a 20% refund on the broken one or I could return them for a full refund. I wanted a replacement but they said the item had been discontinued. I chose the full refund and I asked the lady on the phone if I needed to bring anything else. She said I was good to go and all I needed was the item. So I drove all the way across town to our local UPS store and they couldn't find it in their system. I ended up calling Pottery Barn FIVE times to correct the issue. I ended up having to email UPS which they were kind enough to tell me there was a small charge for that, then after everything looked good they wanted to charge me for a box and packing materials ($10) which I didn't have. The customer service guy "James" kept telling me I could use any box I wanted. I had already told him I was at the store. They don't just give those away. So I wasted an HOUR of my time to walk back out with the item I was trying to return, I'm out the gas money to get to and from and now I can't get my $100 back for these stupid bookends. DO NOT BUY FROM THIS COMMIE COMPANY!

Have you ever wondered why Pottery Barn doesn't have a review section on their site?
There is a reason. It would overflow with negative reviews. The quality of most products is as bad as their customer service. I am trying to return the PB Comfort Square Armchair twin sleeper because after just two months of use I found lots of molded spots all over its mattress, the base and the mattress cover. All that on the invisible side, on the bottom, facing the floor. I took pictures, video, and contacted their customer service. We agreed on the return of that whole thing. Today it's been a month since. I never got an email or a phone call with the confirmation and the date for the return. And when I try to call customer service Pottery Barn are having hard time connecting me with a supervisor, saying it will take up to 72 hrs to get back to me. And no one calls me after the 72 hrs waiting. This is the worst shopping experience I've encountered ever. Not only their products are made in China, but their customer service is a joke too. The lesson learned - go through product's reviews before buying it.

Summary of experience...
- Frequent customer of Pottery Barn
- Ordered a few pieces of furniture on 10/5, delivery scheduled for late Oct great
- Took off day to be there for delivery
- Delivery truck arrives and is missing one of the main pieces
- Called and no one can find the piece
- Eventually got a commitment for prior to Thanksgiving - great, will be there for holiday (we're hosting)
- Later changed and no timeframe for delivery, Pottery Barn can't find the piece
- There's been no less than 2 calls weekly since late Oct to track down the order and get a confirmation for delivery
- At 1-2 hrs weekly over 9 weeks, it's absurd the amount of time my wife has been on the phone
- Being on hold, transferred, had dropped calls, or told to call back to check on status. But we invested that time so that stupidity is squarely on us.
- My wife being more patient than I and very much excited/motivated by the new house furnishings and prepping to have the house looking great for the kids coming home from college and entertaining family and friends
- Throughout, no one was rude. In fact there were very sympathetic, helpful people doing their best to help but Pottery Barn clearly just didn't have access to information or authority to do much in terms of resolution
- But if I hear "we are a preferred customer" one more time based on our purchase historyughh
- Imagine the visceral, negative emotional response that is now hardwired in our heads at any mention of Pottery Barn
- And we blame two parties with this experience.
- Ourselves for the trust, time, and patience we entrusted with Pottery Barn again and again over the last 2 months
- And Laura Albers, the President/CEO, Williams-Sonoma Inc, the parent company of Pottery Barn. We are in no position to understand the organizational structure of the company but based on the many, many employees we interacted with, they very clearly do not have the tooling, authority, and possibly training to fully resolve customer issues. That's a systemic problem that lies with leadership.
- And ultimately when the delivery team comes to bring our missing furniture and they (very likely) do a good job as they typically do, of course we'll give them a high rating along with a tip, they are not responsible for our miserable experience.
- But never, never, never will we or our family buy any product from Williams-Sonoma Inc again, all trust has eroded

I received a desk as a wedding gift, Logan Desk in Antique White. I also received several of the matching pieces for my office. The desk has 3 drawers and 1 large cabinet. The cabinet clearly has holes pre-drilled for shelves, yet the shelves aren't available. So, this cabinet is a waste of space. I complained to Pottery Barn that I needed these shelves, & Pottery Barn weren't helpful at all. Without exaggeration, I spent over an hour on the phone, which included 4 separate calls, because I kept being put on hold, got disconnected, and once the customer service rep. Hung up on me! I used to be a good customer, but today they lost me as a customer. It seems like something is going wrong there. They used to be very good on customer service. Even the wait time to speak to anyone there way too
Long. When I finally did get to speak with a person who was somewhat knowledgeable, they were abrupt and unapologetic and explained that 30 days had past so I was out of luck. I am more than disappointed but will take my business elsewhere. Definitely no longer recommend.

I was planning for a small luncheon for friends, and bought a set of Bistro Outdoor Flatware in Navy Blue. According to the online description, a set included four place settings with three pieces per place setting - spoon, fork, knife.
Was so happy to get before the date, BUT the set of four had transformed into a set ot THREE place settings, with four pieces per setting - 2 spoons, fork and knife.
WHAT DOES ONE DO WITH THREE PLACE SETTINGS? That's ridiculous.
I couldn't even order more, because it was on sale, and has completely disappeared from the PB website. Also, it's not returnable because it was clearance.
I emailed customer service THREE TIMES with no answer, and I couldn't get through on the phone.
So, I had to buy another set on Ebay for $38.00 (instead of $21) just to have a usable set. (and I bet those were being sold by other unhappy buyers, unloading an odd-ball set of three place settings!)
Plus, I was not able to use them for my luncheon.
I know this is a small order and money loss, but these slip ups cost business.
I was about to order over $3,000. In bedroom furniture from PB, but I have changed my mind and will shop elsewhere.
A company that takes pains to present themselves as upscale owes their customers better customer service.

Many years ago I used to love Pottery Barn but they've gone SO downhill since being owned by Williams Sonoma. I ordered 4 items for my son going off to college in a month. Nowhere while ordering did it say "on back-order" or "delivery date in 2 months for this item". Only a week after ordering do I get a message that 2 items are coming, one is on back-order for a month and the 4th has a delivery date for TWO MONTHS. Who orders a set of sheets if Pottery Barn know it will take TWO MONTHS to be delivered? If the website had mentioned that it's on backorder or delivery is slowed, I would have simply picked something else and moved on. So easy... but NOT at Pottery Barn.

It gets worse! You can't cancel the order online so you have to call Pottery Barn Customer Service, which is as bad as calling Comcast Customer Service. The person assures me she has canceled the two remaining items. But guess what? Three weeks later I get an email "Your order is on the way". Seriously?! So I have to call customer service again! (Another 30 minutes of my life that I'll never get back.) The previous women only canceled one of the items AFTER WE HAD A 45 MINUTE CANCELLATION CONVERSATION. And she assured me that for certain the remaining items were canceled and bleh, bleh, bleh. OMG! Seriously? The incompetence is mind boggling! So there is nothing they can do now and I will have to return the item when it comes. Pottery Barn hasn't left the 1990s! Their website, technology, training and personnel are HORRIBLE. It's not worth it. I'll never order from them again. The quality isn't what it used to be and the experience is just not worth it.

Pottery barn furniture is ultimate quality and luxury. We've loved every piece we've ordered from them. However, being repeat furniture customers, we've now learned that almost no furniture purchase with them ever goes smoothly. This is not an issue with other companies like Restoration Hardware, Bassett, or even West Elm. Only Pottery Barn. When we order we know to expect much longer than normal delays, problems with scheduling delivery, no-shows of scheduled deliveries and/or damaged items that need to be sent back. Usually the company offers us reimbursement for the hassle which is a nice bonus and is the only reason we haven't completely given up. However, don't ever order Pottery Barn furniture with any sort of timeline in mind. It will likely take 3x longer to arrive than expected. It is also best if you work at home or are a stay at home wife, etc. as delivery may or may not happen on scheduled days. If you are prepared and expecting a frustrating experience, but are still willing to go through with it to have that beautiful Pottery Barn item in your home. Then go for it! We keep coming back for more too despite all the headaches.