Very Bad Experience with Arentine Designs
I wish to help other consumers in search of a window treatment company for their home draperies by writing an honest review of Arentine Designs of Fairview, TX. It's been quite an experience in finding a reliable, professional and talented window treatment company. I've had the pleasure of meeting a number of fine companies with great people, and I've also had the misfortune of encountering a few unprofessional and inept companies and individuals as well. If I could leave a review of "0" stars for Arentine Designs, I certainly would. I met Marie Adkins, owner of Arentine Designs in July 2021 thru the internet, and I invited her into my home. She was very pleasant and helpful. I explained to her that I was interviewing various companies and that I needed estimates for my window treatments. She provided the estimates within one week. That was all that I asked for and nothing else. At no time did I indicate, imply or suggest to her that I was going to hire her. However, she began doing additional time-consuming research and going beyond what I asked her to do. At first I thought this was necessary in order for her to update her estimates for me, but she continued to work as though I had hired her. This worried me because she seemed to assume that she had earned my business, although we had NO signed contract. She emailed me that she had obtained fabric samples for me from her design center and had shipped them to me. I replied to her that we should hold off on preliminaries until I had officially signed with her company. She seemed to understand my concern in my message because she immediately backed off and I did not receive another email from her until seven days later, which was the following Monday morning. (By that time I had secured another window treatment company.) So I replied to her email that I would call her back that same day, which I did late in the afternoon. I called her and politely thanked her for her estimates and interest, and that my husband and I had decided to hire a different company. She became enraged and began screaming at me for not hiring her. She screamed that she had spent a lot of time on me, and she demanded that I return to her the design center fabrics, and that I should not expect her to pay for freight to return those fabrics to her. When I asked her to send a pre-paid label, she became more enraged and replied that she would drive to my house the next day to pick up the fabrics from my front porch. I certainly wasn't going to pay to return her fabrics which I didn't ask for and she knew it. Needless to say...I don't recommend this unstable woman, lacking in manners and class, and her questionable company. She doesn't deserve anyone's business and I intend to let everyone know. Another bad apple in the drapery business. Fellow consumers, let's stick together and promote only honorable businesses!