How to Stalk and Catch a Bride
If a bride sees a Mary Kay lady coming towards her in the weding gown salon, will she bolt into the dressing room and lock the door? Apparently so – brides are notoriously nervous and flighty. A handout on one Mary Kay sales director’s website explains how she uses David’s Bridal as the camouflage for booking efforts.
Notice how she recommends clothing and a script that hides her Mary Kay affiliation.
David’s Bridal Guidelines
1. Please dress professional (not necessarily a suit) and conservative. (Not too trendy or revealing).
2. I don’t wear any pins, so that it keeps you in line with “service David’s Bridal provides” instead of Mary Kay party thing.
[If you have to hide your business affiliation to get appointments, what does that tell you about the reputation your product and company has?]
6. Try not to bother the staff for facials unless you have built a rap ore [That’s rapport, Cindy, and it’s spelled R-A-P-P-O-R-T] with them and it is a natural next step. We don’t want them to dread us coming in. [What can I say? I’m at a loss for words. Who would ever dread a Mary Kay lady?]
Script:
[Notice how the script dialog avoids the “M-word”… you know, “Mary Kay”. The first time the bride will see the M-word is when the Mary Kay lady is already coming in the door for the pampering session, and it’s too late then.]
While you are there…
“Hi, are you the bride? Great- My name is Cindy and I’m working with David’s bridal offering free pamper sessions for the brides. [The impression she wants to leave is that this is officially part of David’s services, which it might be, but clearly she knows that mentioning Mary Kay will scare the bride right out of her knickers] blah, blan, blah, [get contact information without ever mentioning the “M-word”].
When I call I say…
“Hi, Michelle this is Cindy from David’s Bridal, [again, lying by leaving out the Mary Kay part.] blah blah, get appointment…
Once it’s set I say”
“Now, you can have one other person join you like your mom or maid of honor.”
I do this because of course 2 is better than one and then she thinks it is a privilege and not like she HAS to find someone. It also is great if she is young and broke to have her mother there. [I thought Mary Kay was for women with more month than money, but apparently I was wrong.] Blah, blah, blah.
Ah yes… more sneaky tactics to trick women into having Mary Kay facials. Because apparently if they know the truth, most will run the other way.
Visit the
I imagine the bride cowering in her dressing room like the children in the Jurassic Park kitchen …
That is the funniest image I have ever had of a bride. I love how its lie lie lie.
If the bride is young and BROKE. wow. Just wow.
That is so misleading and horrible! This sales director took a page out of Nerium’s book. Nerium reps are claiming they are partnered with a famous cancer clinic and now Princeton.
I hope David’s Bridal puts a stop to this by banning the pink menace when they come in and try to pretend they are affiliated with the store.
Isn’t it some sort of fraud to pretend you work for some company in order to profit from it? Or an infringement on that other business’ trademark or whatever? Something tells me those tactics are probably not exactly legal.
Yet, David’s Bridal makes a killing off those leads. It’s in their interest to look the other way because they get about $400/month to turn over the names of their brides. That’s pure profit!
The most revealing part of this is not wearing the MK pin. If MK was such a desirable and “prestigious” as they claim, why the need to hide the logo? Would Mercedes hide theirs? Or Bobbi Brown, NARS, or MAC?
The blunt answer is no. Because they’re not desperate for customers and don’t need to cold call people to come to their counters.
Because if there is anything that makes a bride who is about to spend hundreds of dollars at your business happy, it is misrepresentation and duplicity.
This is just horrible! They are going way beyond ‘omitting’ to downright lying!
I really can’t imagine, when a bride keeps that “pampering” appointment and brings her mother and maid of honor, what the reaction will be when she realizes she’s been scammed by a MK bridal stalker. To introduce yourself as someone who works with David Bridal and leave out that you’re really with Mary Kay… I just wouldn’t want to be in the room with Bridezilla, Momzilla or MOHzilla when that happens. I don’t think stressed out brides want their precious time wasted that way, and I’m sure a lot of them would go ballistic when they realize they have been out and out lied to.
Absolutely ridiculous!
….what does David’s Bridal get out of this? Isn’t this soliciting on premises/illegal? This is awful. I would be LIVID if I showed up and it was an MK scam—I would be calling David’s Bridal immediately.
I think the MK consultant has to pay $ to get the names of the brides. When I was trying to build my business… I tried to do this… but the list had been sold already… to about 10 different consultants… they were all trying to call the same names. Big mess.
Lazy Gardens….bwah hah hah!!!!!
Last time I built a rap ore my cat knocked it over. Huge mess. 🙁
Rap ore? Wasn’t that a song in the 80s?
No wait. That was Rap ture. By Blondie.
That is petty bad, and deceptively sneaky! I did a lot of those leads, there its a web service put on by a former mk big wig lady that only consultants can buy from. you payed for a script even. And yes, the whole idea was to trick them into having a party before you ever mention mk. I dont remember the website having such devious undertones as Cindy’s here though. Well needless to say I made no money off of all the bridal leads I purchased. All they did was take the “free” product they “won” and I was left with an empty date book because everybody was always too busy.
Wow. This is one of the worst things I’ve come across them doing. Blatantly lying about working at another company and tarnishing their reputation because your company sucks so hard people run away from you. WAKE UP.
Oh my gosh. Let me tell you, when I was getting married if I was told I was getting a pampering session and I had to wash my own face with their stuff, I would be ticked beyond belief. It’s not pampering if you are doing it yourself!
I saw this on Youtube. New NSD Crystal Trojanowski videotaped herself calling brides. She said “I’m calling on behalf of David’s Bridal and Mary Kay” Atleast she mentioned MK, but it was still secondary to the bridal salon. If you have to lie to do it…ugh!
And the Brides just LOVE this! http://forums.theknot.com/discussion/906926/davids-bridal-mary-kay-scam/p2
That actually happened to me when I was getting married. The MK woman got super unfriendly when I didn’t buy anything.