Ann Taylor Loft

Full review
Discovering Ann Taylor Loft and their Online Store :
Before I met my husband, I shopped at Wal-Mart, Fashion Bug, Rave, Dress Barn, and other cheap girls'stores. My clothes would fall apart quickly and I always got mistaken for being much younger than I am. Luckily for me, my husband believes in quality, not quantity when it comes to clothes. He also suggested, "If I wanted to look my age, I would have to dress my age." This meant shopping at a womans'store, not at the teen dream stores.

We discovered our first Ann Taylor loft store in Methuen, Massachusetts in 2004. The store was wonderful, but 2 hours from where we lived (this was over a year before the one at Holyoke Mall opened, which is still an hour from where we live.) In the autumn Ann Taylor Loft usually has a deal where for every $50 you spend in one visit you get a $25 card for the next time you shop and spend $50. You have to come back to the store in a designated time period. I wanted to use the cards I accumulated, but it meant having to plan another long trip to and from this store. I mentioned this to the sales clerk who informed me that not only did Ann Taylor Loft have an online store, but I could use the cards there.

Online Store:

The website is: www.anntaylorloft.com/

There is also a website for Ann Taylor, which is more expensive and sells a different style of women's clothes so you have to be careful to find the right website. Side note: You can use your Ann Taylor credit card on both sites and at both stores or at their factory store.

What Will I Find:
Ann Taylor Loft's online store sells women's clothing. Clothing is available for petite women in sizes 00-16 and regular sized women in sizes 00-18. There are outfits for work, parties, casual wear, and beach wear. If you are looking for a top you will find jackets, sweaters, blouses, shirts, tanks, and other knit tops to suit your needs. If you are looking for a bottom you will find shorts, skirts, pants, and extra long pants. Suits, dresses, sleepwear, and swimwear is also available. The site also offers stylish closed and opened toe shoes. Accessories include purses, winter wear, jewelry, belts, and socks. There is also a new section for toddlers' sizes 2-5, which currently has a small selection for girls.

Navigation:

Accessing help:
Ann Taylor Loft's online store has a homepage with all the trimmings. On the front page you will be able to find their phone number for instant gratification if you ever have a problem or a question. Frequently Asked Questions are also readily available under the help button. You can search careers, find store locations, find additional contact information, join the mailing list, log into or create an account. If you have or are thinking about ordering, this front page also gives you easy viewing to the number of items in your shopping bag, link to check-out, purchase a gift card, or track your current order. If you get confused while trying to find something, you can click on the site-map or type what you are looking for in the search engine.

Finding Items:
If you want to shop in store, along with the store locator, the front page also announces new Loft stores. If you want to shop online, links to clothing are broken down into the following categories: Sales items, Outfits, Apparels, Petites, Footwear/Accessories, and Trends.

Clicking on sales items brings you to a page where you can either view all sales items or click on a category such as pants or jackets to see which of these items are on sale. Selecting outfits brings you to a page where you can search by type of outfit be it for work, parties, or other. Apparel leads you to a page where you can select whether you are looking for pants, shorts, sweaters, and other items. Clicking on petites brings you to a page with the same subcategories as apparel only in petite sizes. Footwear and Accessories brings you to a page broken down into type of shoes, type of jewelry, travel, handbags, and more. Loft Trends is a relatively new link and gives you advice on what to wear and shows you different outfits to choose from.

If you click on any mentioned links from the homepage, not only will you be directed to a page with the subcategories, but you will also have the option of changing categories. Example: After viewing Outfits, I can select Apparel without going back to the homepage.

My Experience:

Selecting Items to Purchase:
I found the site easy to navigate. I was not sure what I was looking for so first I went through all the subcategories and browsed different items. There were many sophisticated styles for work and a lot of party outfits like a pink tie dyed skirt with ruffled trim (This looks 10 times better than what you are probably picturing). Prices ranged from $20-$150 an item. Sales items ranged from $15-$40.

After looking at suits, and sundresses, wraps and denim, and shoes and accessories galore, I knew I had to get realistic and use the search engine. The problem is I have eczema and am very sensitive to many materials. I find that 100% cotton is the only thing that never irritates my skin. Not a problem for Ann Taylor Loft. I put cotton into the search engine at the top of the home page (or the top of any page on the site). Seven pages of items came up, which is a very good cotton selection for any store. On the page with all cotton items I further searched by price range and sizes available. There were 67 cotton items that were in my size and 42 of those items were between $40 and $70 which was my current price range.

I selected three items all 100% cotton. First I ordered a lace detail top, looking at the size chart to make sure it would fit, I added it to my shopping bag and decide to return to the page I was looking at. Unfortunately, there is not button to click to do this and I have to press back a few times. Next I chose a pair of corduroy full leg pants with slightly flared bottoms. Click back a few times again. And finally a skirt called piped flounce in white with black trim, which looked like it would hug my curves and then slightly flare at the bottom.

Purchasing:
The first thing I consider when purchasing is shipping costs. If shipping is going to cost more then the clothes, I will go somewhere else. Unfortunately, Ann Taylor Loft, like many other stores, directs you to a page to create an account after clicking check-out. This means I have to create an account in order to see the shipping costs. There is no way to purchase without creating an account. My thought is, "If I do not approve of the shipping costs and do not make the purchase, they will still have my email to send me unwanted emails." There is a selection you can make though to not receive emails.

Shipping Costs:
After registering for an account, that I may not want, Ann Taylor Loft brings me to another page this time wanting my name, address, and phone number. Luckily on this page, I can view shipping rates before entering my information. The shipping costs are flat rate, which means no matter how much you spend on items, you will have the same shipping costs. They range from $3 for standard or $25 for next business day delivery. After clicking standard, I am moved forward to order detail. I have no idea what method they will use to ship and cannot move back in the screen to find out. I click the back button, which tells me to log in. After much confusion involving signing in to my new account, clicking check-out again and re-entering my name, address, and phone number, I still have no idea what method they use for shipping. I decide to be safe rather then sorry and select three day shipping.

Order Tracking:
I finish ordering by putting in my credit card information and confirming order. Within a few minutes, I receive an email to confirm credit card approval. The email tells me to call immediately if I wish to cancel my order. There is also a link in the email for tracking, which brings me to the Ann Taylor Loft page and I must sign in to my account and click on tracking. Over the next few days I check tracking to see my order go from packing to shipping UPS to getting to different UPS stations to finally arriving at my local UPS. The tracking then states, "Package is out for delivery." After I sign, it says the package is delivered.

Receiving My Order:
I signed for my box and opened it to find each item wrapped in its own plastic bag with tissue paper between each item. Each item looked just as it had on the site and fit well. The return policy was in the box detailing instructions to place unwanted item in box, seal, and use provided return sticker at no cost to me. I could also return the item to any Loft store.

Return:
After wearing my corduroys for several months, I squatted down in a store and the pants gave way at the seams. This was highly embarrassing. I still had my receipt and brought the corduroys to my new local Ann Taylor Loft store, where they agreed that it was a manufacturing problem and asked if I would like my money or a credit. I took the credit, which was good at both the store and online.

Recommendations:
I recommend Ann Taylor Loft Online Store for women's clothing. The Loft has clothes, accessories, and jewelry for all occasions whether you are looking for work, party, or casual wear. The prices are higher than other retail stores, but the quality of the clothing is exceptional. In addition they stand behind their return policy and will refund you if the clothing does not last the way it should, as in my case that I mentioned.