PSA: don’t go to Douglas J Aveda Institute in Royal Oak
Hey ya’ll, I had the most horrible experience as a customer. And I want to warn you about it so you don’t ever get screw out like 15 hours and $200 not including gas and parking. I went to get my hair bleached and dyed lilac at my local Aveda, because as you might be able to tell from my blog– I love pastels. I had previously tried to bleach my hair myself, so I was advised to give my hair some rest after they bleached it. I was told to come back in 3 weeks, and then they would dye my hair lilac. I wanna note to you at no time did anyone especially not the instructors told me that there was even a possibility that they would not be able to dye my hair lilac. So I came in 3 weeks later and after talking to the instructor the student came back and told me that her instructor had advised that we dye my hair a dark purple, assuring me it would fade to the color I wanted, but it would last much longer. I had no reason to doubt her, so I said sure as long as it would fade to the color I wanted. The actual instructor came over and gave me the same run down about 5 minutes later. Again, I agreed as long as I would get lilac in the end. SPOILER ALERT MY HAIR NEVER FADED TO THAT COLOR, NOR DID IT LAST LONGER. Within about 2-3 days of me washing with purple shampoo my hair turned to an INCREDIBLY desaturated Lavender. When I stood in blue light(LED and Sun Light) it looked about %50 lavender 50% gray, and overall it was muddy. Tustang light a.k.a almost all indoor lighting, I looked a muddy gray. By the end of the week I was straight up gray. But I thought whatever the student said they would fix it for free within a 2 week timespan if I was unhappy. So after work the next Thursday I called in to schedule a repair appointment and went in the very next day. The instructor takes one look at me and goes “your hair is too dark, if you want it fixed, well have to rebeach it”. After some calculations she tells me that it will cost me $102. At which I go hell no I’ve already spent a small fortune. So instead they tell me they’ll do a treatment that will remove the artificial color build up and it will be $30. And I felt like a broken woman so I agree hoping it’ll be the last of it. So they do the treatment and squirt in some toner it my hair, and now I’m a dark blond with some uneven purple spots. The teacher proceedes to stand there and tell me that my hair is too dark and it would have never been able to be lilac in the first place, so she’s just admitted to knowingly wasting more of my money. Then she basically says too bad so sad and sends me to the counter with the student who is visibly uncomfortable because she knows I’m miserable. When I get to the counter it turns out the treatment was on $25, big whoop. I held back tears as I paid and walked out sobbing on the way to my car. Normally this would be the end of the story for me, but within a few hours I’m seething because I don’t even earn $200 in 2 weeks and I’m stuck with hair I HATE. So my mother offers to call Aveda for me and I say please do. After ignoring my mothers calls for awhile the director of the school finally calls back and imply a that I lied and tells my mother they aren’t giving a cent back. So here I am warning you. Do yourself a favor and STAY AWAY FROM AVEDA.
