A HUE and Cry over Tights: Macys, Kayser Roth and Hue Are Missing the Point of Ads and Internet Sales

Let’s give you a bit of history over this event because it’s important to put this into a historical perspective. In late September or early October, MACYS So. California ran a full page ad on HUE tights in all sorts of patterns, colors and stripes. As a tight junkie, I was in heaven. I went on the MACYS website but there were no tights resembling the ones in the newspaper ad. I had called a store but they put me on hold for a hellish length of time and I hung up. Knowing I would be near a large MACYS store in LA in a couple of days, I figured I might find some stock left from the ad and be able to at least order from another store as well.

When I hit the MACYS Beverly Center, it was 10:30 or 11 AM and I went in hunt of the tights. They had HUE tights there but nothing — zero, zip, nada– resembling the patterns shown in the ad. I was trying to hunt around for a saleperson– but after 30 minutes of hunting around the hosiery department and being seen by MACYS staff, no one offered to assist me. I kept trying to get someone to help me but they were either busy doing stock work or were talking to others. Given that I was running flat out of time after checking virtually every hosiery drawer in the department, I left for my next appointment because I had given this task too much attention.
However my quest for striped and patterned tights didn’t stop there. I knew that HUE was a company that often ran the same things on their website and I kept checking back every 10 days or so to see if those tights were online, but they weren’t available. I did call and leave a message at the HUE customer service number after hours and asked someone to call or email me back about the tights I had seen in the MACYS ad but no one ever did. I figured that was just life and maybe I would keep checking back about those tights but with less effort placed on the search.

By late October, knowing that I wanted some additional colors, I started hunting down tights again. By November 3, I hit the HUE.com site and found the same patterns that were in the ad! I placed an order for each color of the striped tights and bought a third pair — well just because I wanted the particular knit style. I got an confirmation on 11/3 time-stamped at 11:30 AM.
By 11/17, I had not received anything from HUE- no tights, no emails, no nothing. I thought it was odd and so I picked up the phone and called their customer service center. While waiting about 15-20 minutes or so, I finally got someone who checked the order number. I asked why I hadn’t gotten a notice of shipment. I was told “we are behind, It’s our busy season” . Yes, I got that. It’s getting to be winter and it’s holiday shopping time and everyone is busy. That’s not the answer I wanted. I did get an update that one of the tights– the bordeaux stripe was no longer available.
I asked when was I going to be told about that– and why didn’t they email me. Again it was the “we are behind. It’s our busy season” and this time, I got ” I was going to call you today”. Turns out when you have an order with part of the products are no longer in stock, they have to cancel that first order and re-enter the order. (sigh). I asked about why they don’t indicate that those styles aren’t available online or why isn’t there automated emails stating that something is out of stock. ” We don’t do internet well”
I then went up a notch to speak to a customer service superviser who pretty much reiterated the same spiel and I kept asking why I wasn’t notified sooner. That 14 days for an order to not be shipped is an long time. I asked if there was someone else I could speak to, but the person wasn’t being forthcoming about helping me out there. Kayser Roth who owns HUE, No Nonsense and Kayser Roth Intimates and hosiery has been around a long time. It’s not a new company. I asked the supervisor why a big company isn’t up to speed on their website. That degenerated into a conversation about the size of the company and why they aren’t as savvy about the internet and the site hasn’t been up all that long.( The site’s been up at least 2 years so that doesn’t work in my frame of reference). I told her that the biggest problem here for them is that I am going to blog about this and it’s not going to be pretty.
I thanked the supervisor for her time and tell her that I am going to reach out to the corporate level because I think something isn’t right when I am being told ” it’s their busy time of year and they are behind” why a customer can’t get updated about an order.

Kayser Roth Corporate HQ
Long story shorter: I wind up calling NYC who routes me back to NC to speak to what I hope would be the assistant to the CEO. to help me figure out what is going on and to give them a heads up about the post going live almost immediately because I feel that customers — particularly those who shop on the web– have a right to be updated about products that they order and which they have paid for. (yes I know that’s ending a sentence with a preposition but I can’t figure out how to not make it sound stilted so it’s just going to be that way)
I spend some time talking to Kevin Toomey who answered the phone and I asked if he were the assistant to the CEO or if he could help me with a customer problem. He asks me about the problem and I give him the story that is written above. I make sure he knows I am a journo/writer and about to put this on the web and it’s as much to give Kayser Roth a heads up on some not so great press and to also to make them aware of the problems at the distribution center.
He says he will call me back, because he wants to “walk down the hall and check on a few things” to see if this can be sorted out. I asked his name again because I wanted to put it in the story — which he did and I made sure I had the spelling correct. I asked for his title and he hesitated. I said I wanted to put it into the post because it would show relevance. ” CEO and president, Kayser Roth”. He promised to call me back in an hour and takes my number.
I must say right now that Mr. Toomey was incredibly nice and listened carefully to what I had to say. I had been pretty specific, made some serious points about internet business and he wanted to check out what the situation on these orders.

Guess what– Mr. Toomey did call me back— within an hour. Good news and bad news. They are entirely out of stock on the one pair of tights that I wanted, but they still had the other two. I was assured that the order would go out this week, hopefully by Thursday.
He explained what had happened in the supply chain of stock because of the severe weather that had hit the eastern portion of the country and demand had been incredibly more than usual for that time of year. However they do build that into their plans for that as a situation that can be dealt with. Not only did he share that,he also told me that the customer service was somewhat lacking and needed some work because what I was told by the customer service person and the supervisor wasn’t acceptable customer service.

Hue Showroom
The next statements from Mr. Toomey showed me that Kayser Roth really does care about their customers– no matter who they are. He thanked me for calling because they needed to know about these issues because it showed them 2 problems with the website and the ordering process of which they had been unaware and they were i going to make some changes in the inventory shown on the the site and the ordering process immediately. Toomey indicated that Kayser Roth knows that the internet sales are incredibly important and they are proud of their creative team and they believe they have a good product. I agreed and made a couple more suggestions, one of which was to pull off online photos of products no longer in stock.
We ended the very pleasant discussion with his apology and that he assured me he would call me next week to see if I had the tights that I had ordered. I thanked him for his time. I said that the post would reflect the time he had taken to speak to me but also to see about assessing the problem immediately.
That’s corporate responsibility. Kevin Toomey is a very smart businessman. I liked Hue before this. I like Hue even more now– despite that I don’t have the one pair of tights.
I even ordered two more pairs of tights in other similar colors– that’s how impressed I was– plus they were on sale too.
As a side note about my order: it wound up that 2 of 3 styles ordered were unavailable and I am getting one pair– so the extra 2 that I ordered just after speaking with Mr Toomey was a wise decision.. and I am disappointed in not getting the other pair but not surprised either despite reassurances from that supervisor.
So a situation that could have ended with a really negative post about a brand– and with social media implications of hitting twitter and facebook making it visible to everyone– turned out to be a social media win for Toomey, Hue and Kayser Roth because the company really does care about its’ customers and they listen to them.
Wake up corporate America, you need to follow the example that Toomey took with me. I know that some companies have some sort of social media out reach– but it might not be really engaging. Just having a twitter account and a facebook page won’t win and influence your potential clients. It’s what you do with them and how you interact with customers whether established or potential– is the key.
A lesson in social media marketing and plain old good customer service.
Stevie Wilson