I Ordered a Weighted Blanket, but Only the Disappointment Was Heavy
By: Shannon Ashley
Tags: Life Lessons, Communication, Marketing, Entrepreneurship, Business

I recognized that it was Thanksgiving and most likely a busy time for shop owners. I admitted to myself that this was annoying, but hardly the end of the world, if all it meant was that my long-awaited blanket was going to arrive a week late.

The problem, however, is that I had no idea what was going on because the shop owner hadn’t reached out to me even once.

That’s the part that really left a bad taste in my mouth.

So, I sent the seller a message on Thanksgiving to let them know the tracking had been idle for a week in pre-shipment and explained that Etsy’s timeline indicated I was to receive the blanket by the 28th, which at that point, was the next day.

Then, Black Friday came and went. My daughter and I stayed home and watched movies while I worked. The tracking information for my blanket still hadn’t changed, and the shop owner hadn’t replied to my message.

Since I was supposed to have received the blanket already, I was now able to “open a case,” to let Etsy and the seller know I hadn’t gotten my order. I opened the case last night and explained that if the blanket could be promptly shipped, that was my preferred solution. If it wasn’t finished? Then, a refund might be in order.

I woke up this morning to my very first message from the shop owner:

“Hi Shannon, I apologize as I did not work yesterday with it being Thanksgiving. I thought I sent you a message regarding the delay but I am not seeing anything, so that is my fault. The shipment of weight (which usually takes 2 days took over a week. It was delivered to my husbands work Wednesday and he picked it up today. I will be filling your blanket this weekend and shipping Monday. These cases are extremely detrimental to shops, to the point it can close them with very little warning. I would truly appreciate if you would close the case and give me the chance to fulfill your order. If not, I think it would be best for me to refund your order as this is my only source of income from me for my family. I am truly sorry for my lack of communication. Let me know what you would like to do.”

To be honest, when I first read the message, I felt like a big jerk. It’s Thanksgiving week and this is a mom who works at home just like me. Communication isn’t my forte either, so I felt pretty guilty that I’d even opened up the case at all.

But then I sat back and looked at what she was telling me. I placed the order on November 2 and it was scheduled to ship by November 22 in order to be received by the 29th. This meant that she knew for a while that her timeline was going to deviate, and she didn’t check in to ask if I was okay with that.

So, now, a day after I was supposed to receive the goods, the shop owner reveals the blanket isn’t done a week after she created the shipping label and took the time to mark it as shipped in Etsy.

That wasn’t just absentminded. That was wholly deceptive. The shop owner marked my order as shipped before she even had the materials, knowing it usually took two days to come in. Once you factor in labor, I’m curious when she ever would have notified me.

Per her note, she now planned to ship the blanket on December 2, a full ten days after the scheduled shipping deadline.