Weddingbee

An email from a reader…

Hi Mrs. Bee,

Since attending the Great Bridal Expo in NYC, I have been bombarded with spam mail and “free hotel” scams. So far I’ve received three calls about us “winning” 3-day, 2-night stays at nice hotels e.g. Hilton, Marriott etc. They always ask you to come in somewhere to pick up your vouchers.

After some trusty google searches I always find out it is some scam to sell you cookware or timeshares. Any more knowledge on this phenomenon? Here is a link to one of the companies that called me.

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/homeowners/royal_prestige_trip.html

Crunch Fitness was also there and they called me a few weeks after the expo telling me I had “won” a gym membership and for me to come in to claim my prize.

After some probing I found out that I had to take a 30 min tour with a manager and then I would receive a scratch-off card for a 1 yr, 6 months, 3 months, 1 month or 1 week free membership. As I was talking to the rep I went to their homepage and there in big bold letters was the same offer of a scratch-off card for ANY person who came in for a tour. How did I “win” anything?

I should clarify that each vendor at the Expo held a drawing for a free prize and the expo coordinators pre-printed address labels for me to submit to each vendor.

Thanks for looking into this!

Sandy

~~~

Dear Sandy,

I’ve only attended one bridal show and that was this past weekend with a friend of mine who’s a bride-to-be. They weren’t interested in any of my contact information since I wasn’t a bride, but they haven’t sent a single piece of junk mail to my friend either.

When I registered for the liweddings website though, I remember being bombarded with solicitations from wedding vendors. Our mailbox was filled to the brim daily. I contacted liweddings, and they immediately took me off their mailing list which solved the problem. Still, I’d assumed that the information I provided was for that website/vendor only.

The wedding industry is a very competitive and lucrative one, and eager brides may be an easy target. On the more permissable end is what Crunch Fitness did - offered you an existing promotion leading you to believe that it was a prize unique to you. On the more blurry end is what these cookware/timeshare companies often do - offer a prize but only if you sit through several hours of a hard sell on their products.

I’ve done some preliminary research and found a lot of interesting information pertaining to bridal shows and these “cookware/timeshare” offers. Unfortunately you’ll have to wait until Part II on Monday because I’m off to Boston to celebrate my one year anniversary this weekend.

Meanwhile, I’d like to ask our readers about their experiences with bridal shows. Have you ever been spammed or scammed?

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