Complaint Review: White Willow Studio - Naperville Illinois

I am a DJ that was contracted by White Willow to do a wedding. I have not been paid for the job, and have not heard from them since the day of the wedding. I have been in contact with the bride and groom, and they have not had any communication from Kay or anyone from White Willow since their wedding day. They owe me $400 dollars and the bride and groom paid them $4000 and have no pictures or video from their wedding day.

This is in response to White Willow's comments. We are the couple that got married on 7/27.

Beginning the end of may/start of June we tried contacting white willow studio because we were promised a meeting with Kay and the videographer a month prior to our wedding. No response was received for almost a whole month. We even emailed a videographer once contracted by white willow try to get a hold of them. Finally, at the end of june Kay contacted us through a new email address. We told her we have lined up another videographer and asked for a refund and her response was, and I quote, "a refund is not an option as we have done nothing to violate the contract. All we would need to film the wedding is your timeline, and we usually ask for that a week before as thats when it's typically finalized so that youre not stressed and its an easy exchange. Please let me know how you would like to move forward." and we responded, "if we have no way of getting out of the contract then we need to meet with the videographer soon. So if you continue working with us, know that we will be very particular with our video." she immediately responded and said she would be set up a meeting, asked when is a good time for us, and said she would get in contact with her videographer to arrange that ASAP. I gave my availability, and on June 30 she replied, "talking with my videographer about what works for him. I will get back to you ASAP." that was the last we heard from Kay or anyone from white willow studio.

We proceeded to email them 16 times almost daily until july 23rd (4 days before our wedding). I emailed them the church guidelines needed to be signed prior to the wedding (TWICE), sent messages letting them know we've made changes and asking for a response.... I don't think messages like that would make it seem like we wanted to cancel. We never once said the word CANCEL, we never said we booked a replacement videographer (we lined one up just in case we got a refund), nor did we ever say we didn't want them at our wedding. Kay, I have every email we sent (my almost 30 emails to you and your 4 to us). Get your facts straight! Don't make liars out of honest people, not just us, but all of your other customers.

By the way, since you apparently read these comments and respond to messages here and not emails that are sent directly to you, we are demanding our refund for services never provided. We've emailed you multiple times now, but to no surprise, we have yet to receive a response.

Again, what White Willow Studio is saying about our wedding is a lie. You even had the nerve to tell us in email from you on June 28 "we have followed through everything thus far and would never take advantage of anyone." You lead us on to believe that you were filming our wedding, so that was a lie!!

While you and my fiance might not be having the best communication.  I have been nothing but curtious so why not call me?  I'm the bride.  I asked for a phone number before all of this and never recieved one, I asked for an address on where you sent a letter with new contact information and explaining the situation never got a response.  You say that our wedding is a month away, well if you look at the contract we had a before and after to shoot 2nd weeks of August, next week?  When were we going to be contacted to schedule that? 

You say that you asked us to send a timeline, false you said someone would be contacting us shortly and no one ever did.  The claims you are making about others is also defamation of character as you are calling them liars?  Yes my friends did not have a bad experience so I was very confused at first which was why I sent a message to Kaylea asking for a phone call ASAP as I was freaking out. The best thing to do would have been to call me and explain all the negative things I had been reading online but I didn't. 

And then my fiance drove to your office and it was gone, and according to neighboring businesses we weren't the only ones to stop in.  So at this point I can not hold their experience to my own as it already was completely different, and we are now dealing with a company that has no office, no phone, no email, no cell phone, had moved from their current home address so how do you expect anyone to react when clearly the company has issues and we were never made aware, but instead sent an invoice for final payment?  Yes we are upset, but your "willing" to provide services is not a guarantee you will actually show up. 

We have heard from another vendor a dj was booked for this weekend and still not paid? You can understand how we don't want our special day ruined.  My fiance is also dealing with a lot seeing his father was on life support until Monday and has since passed away.  Point is everyone goes through major life changes but to pick up a phone and call us would not have been so difficult, the way everything was handled was very unproffesional.  We contacted you through fb as we had no other way to contact you...you could have replied through new contact email or called us...you do have our contract right?  You also have only responded to these reports and posts and still not replied through email?

LOL.  You guy's are unreal.  So easy to blame it one everyone else, however, we have all the proof we need.  Don't forget buddy all of our correspondance are being documented which is proving you can't even get your lies straight.    We also found out your not only ripping off soon to be brides your also ripping off the DJ's you contracted to do the weddings.  I wonder what those brides are going to think when their DJ doesn't show up.  Save your lies and dishonesty for the court.  You replying with falsifying information is making you look like even a bigger fool.

Lastly, yes, you and Kaylea are dishonest SCUMBAGS!!  And you SCUMBAGS will be brought to justice.

We contacted the couple getting married on 7/27 in mid to late June to get information regarding their wedding and they told us they were another company and did not want us to provide the service because they had not been able to reach us. I can't be blamed for clients assuming we're not going to honor the contract. We told the client if they canceled, we would not be able to refund them because staff was already contracted, and they told us they did not want us to do their wedding.

I am not providing you with a phone number because you have been nothing but disrespectful. I provided you with an e-mail to send the timeline, which is all I needed from you (all we need from anyone 2-4 weeks before their wedding), but you guys chose to just message via Facebook saying you didn't want us to do the wedding (that is still upcoming, and were willing to do).

I have nothing to gain by disputing your comments or saving the name of White Willow Studio, we aren't accepting new weddings, I just want to set the record straight. If you call us scumbags or say insulting things about our children on Facebook, why am I going to talk on the phone with you when you clearly made your decision based on false pretenses?

Well you didn't show up to a wedding you said you were going to honor on 7/27/2012.

This company and all companies associated with it are a scam.  If you don't believe me google: White Willow Studio and read all the nasty things they did to people on Chicago Weddings.  Things from not showing up to not providing video footage of a wedding they were contracted at.  What's the excuse for that?

In addition, we've tried to contact your organization multiple times with no response.  Anthony, I sent you an email three days ago to provide a contact number for your dishonest company.  Was that provided?  No, there was nothing provided other than a yahoo email account you just created which I stated was not an acceptable means of communication.  I'm still waiting for that number by the way.

A lot of information provided here is incorrect and unfounded and I feel it is important to set the record straight. While White Willow Studio is not booking new weddings,  it is honoring the contracts of all clients that it has already signed. The company is still legally active.

White Willow Studio has not renewed its toll-free number, office lease, and e-mail service as we are no longer looking for NEW business, but we are still honoring every contract that was signed and will be contacting our clients when necessary information is needed for their specific wedding. White Willow Studio has NEVER not performed a wedding service it was contracted to, except under two circumstances where the couples told us not to come and would not be permitted to provide them the services because they were unhappy with the amount of constant communication available prior to the wedding, which I have documented. We were 100% willing to provide the services and they told us they were hiring someone else and did not want our staff at their event.

I can tell by the way it is written in comparison to recent communications I have had with this couple as well as the contract amount that the complaint listed here is filed by our clients for the UPCOMING wedding on September 1, 2012. I have let them know that we have already contracted staff to provide video service for their wedding (over a year in advance they were contracted) and they told us they did not want us to, they only wanted a refund. Providing a refund is impossible when the company has already contracted and paid staff to provide the services on their day. White Willow Studio stands 100% willing to honor the contract, but J&J (not to give their full names at this point publicly out of respect and confidentiality, even though they have no respect for us) have told us they do not want us to provide the services at their wedding and are seeking legal action. Legal action for what? We were contracted to provide a service and stand willing to provide it, and now they want to cancel because they are unhappy with the level of communication we have had during a very difficult time in our lives. The fact is, the wedding is over a month a way, I have asked them to send me their timeline when I last messaged them, and they are electing instead to say they don't want us to come. The contract obligates the customer to pay, the customer has paid, the contract obligates us to provide the service on the day, and it is our plan to. There is no provision for canceling the service in the contract. If client elects to have us provide the service or continues to stonewall the fact that we are providing the service for their wedding, either way, I will provide the information here.

White Willow Studio is scamming clients out of money? This is far from the truth. White Willow Studio provided wedding photography and videography services as recently as Friday, July 20th and 21st in Lombard and will be covering all three services for a wedding this upcoming Saturday, August 4th. Some clients have been upset because they couldn't be in constant communication with us and have chose not to respect our privacy during an extremely tough time in our family lives, but we have always gotten in contact with the client prior to the wedding to get the timeline information (and in two of these instances, the couples have chosen not to allow us to provide the service on the day)

In fact, we provided photography, videography, and DJ entertainment services for friends of the couple that filed this complaint and received nothing but positive feedback. They should know better that we are not the kind of people to run away with their money. Just because people are going through tough life changes which are extremely personal and I am not going to get into detail about here and aren't available 24/7 at their disposal does not mean they're not going to honor their contractual agreement.

White Willow Studio has weddings booked and will be providing services for several more weddings, the final wedding being in early December. Because of this permanent false information posted, it has caused a frenzy with current clients that were not concerned and had no reason to be worried. Our goal is to never create animosity with anybody, but the same time our family life needs to be respected and has not been for a long time by multiple clients.

In summary, White Willow Studio has and will perform every wedding we are contracted to unless obstructed from doing so by the clients.

White Willow Studio will contact all clients for upcoming weddings to let them know contact information they can reach us when needed.