Dance Teacher Tips: Costume Exchanges

Exchanging Costumes

When ordering recital costumes it is very important to measure the students properly; be sure you have ordered the right costumes and especially be sure you have ordered the right sizes.

Every costume company has their own measurement chart (just like every company that manufactures dresses or suits), so be sure you use the chart that corresponds to that particular company. Do not assume that if you ordered a medium from one company you can automatically order a medium from another company. It just doesn’t work that way.

No matter how carefully you measure your students, there are still a few problems that can occur.

For example: You are measuring your students in September or October and may not receive your costumes until December or January or later. Will the students grow during that time? Will he or she gain some weight during that time? Is your student starting to mature and her body starting to change shape? All these possibilities have to be taken into consideration when deciding what sizes to order for your students.

You know your students better than anyone else and you need to make certain decisions based on that knowledge. Should you order the size your student measures or should you order a size larger? That is one very difficult decision to make, but it is very important and has to be made. You have to take into account the type of costume it is, the type of material that it is made of, how much will it stretch etc. All these things have to be thought through so that you will have as few problems with your order when it arrives.

When your order does arrive, you should try on the costumes as soon as possible to see if there are any problems.

If you ordered the wrong costumes, most companies will not be able to take them back since they were made, cut, and sewn for your order, and if they take them back there is a very good chance that they will be stuck with them and will be useless to the company.

If the costume is not the costume you ordered and they sent you the wrong costume, most costume companies will take them back and exchange them for the right costume quite promptly since it was their fault. (But be sure you definitely did not order that costume.)

If the costume is not the size you ordered, then the same scenario exists. If it is the fault of the company, most will exchange it promptly. (Again, be sure that they sent the wrong size and you didn’t order the wrong size.)

With all of the above reasons for exchange, most companies will ask you to return the costumes before they can send you the correct ones. This is standard procedure. However if you are in a real rush, it might behoove you to pay for an additional costume with the understanding that you will return the other one and they will refund the money. You must return the costume immediately. If you return it three or four weeks later most costumes companies probably will not accept it.

NOW COMES THE BIGGEST PROBLEM OF ALL!

Let us assume it was YOUR mistake. YOU ordered the wrong costumes or the wrong sizes and you want to exchange it for the correct ones.

If you need the costumes in the near future you probably will not be able to exchange it. An exchange takes just as long as a new order and there is nothing the company can do to rush the exchange any faster. They are busy making the costumes for the customers who are still waiting for their original orders and they have to fill those orders first.

There is always the rare chance that the company MIGHT have the size or the costume IN STOCK. This is a possibility, but don’t count on it. Once the season starts, very little is in stock just waiting for someone to ask for it.

NOW SOME TEACHERS ASK THE QUESTION, “WHY DON’T THE COSTUME COMPANIES MAKE EXTRA COSTUMES IN CASE A TEACHER NEEDS TO MAKE AN EXCHANGE?”

The answer is pretty much the same for any costume house that manufactures costumes.

IT WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE!

WHY?

Let us assume that a costume company has four hundred or more costumes in their line. They come in approximately eight sizes. If a company stocked only two of each size for exchanges, that is an overstock of about 6,400 costumes. (And that is only two of each size.) What if a teacher needed to exchange three or four, or if five or six teachers wanted to make exchanges? It wouldn’t be any where near enough. But even at only two of a size, that is an overstock of AT LEAST $150,000.00! There is no company in the industry that could afford having $150,000.00 of extra costumes just in case someone might want to make an exchange. Remember. The problem is that if the costumes are not used for exchanges then the companies are stuck with all these costumes. It would be a lose/lose situation for the company and it would raise prices substantially, IF the company could sustain the loss and not go out of business.

All companies know the problems that the dance teachers face and will do whatever they can do to make the life of a teacher easier, but there is only so much they can do within reason. They invest a fortune in the beautiful catalogs they print and send to you, and then they gamble by manufacturing a basic inventory of tens of thousands of costumes long before they receive their first orders. They have no idea which costumes are going to be their best sellers or which ones are going to be “dogs”, but they manufacture them anyway to try and give you the best delivery possible.

It is a very difficult situation for them. They must order a large amount of material and trims months in advance, pay for them, start manufacturing, and then hope that they have picked the right “stuff’. It is also difficult because the season is so short, the orders pour in all at the same time, and deliveries are requested just about on the same day.

Every business has its’ headaches and problems just like the problems that you face every day running a studio. The same way you like you try to please the parents as much as you can there is only so much you can do. It is the same with the costume companies. They want desperately to please you since you are their only customers and they want you to order from them year after year. They will bend over backwards to try and please you, but there is only so much they can do.

Just like in your studio, “It takes two to tango”. It takes two to make it work. It takes YOU and it takes the COMPANY. If you both work together it can be a wonderful and pleasant experience ordering costumes.

Art Stone