Bridal Gowns Too

While our focus is on the whole bridesmaid thing, we get a special thrill when the bride decides to use us for her wedding dress. We take the responsibility of making great bridesmaids dresses very seriously -- it is our customers' weddings after all. However, there's a special sense of satisfaction when we find out that the bride herself wore one of our gowns during her big day. We always get a little extra excited it when we see orders for white satin dresses. A big thank you to Katelyn for sharing her photo with us.

Winning Over the Bride's Mom

We love getting emails and letters from happy customers. We think our favorite to date though is the one below from Christi, who was the mother of the bride in the wedding. It's one thing to impress the bride with our dresses and service, but when the mom checks in . . . well, we must be doing something right. Great photo too of our short sleeve style dress!

"I wanted to write and thank you for a wonderful experience! My daughter, Amy, was married in Washington DC on May 31, 2008. The six bridesmaids were living all over the world. We were lucky enough to find Coco Myles because Amy wanted a short sleeve, modest neckline, tea-length dress and you had the perfect dress."

"Each girl ordered their own navy satin dress with a long sash in ivory. The neckline matched the bride's dress which was the dress her grandmother was married in 50 years ago. The girls called it the "magic dress" because everyone fit perfectly (no altering was needed by anyone) and they all loved it. As we were heading to the ceremony a man in the parking garage commented "nice dress...you can actually wear those again". Thank you for making this part of my daughter's wedding perfect!"

Hot Pink Hawaii

Here's a great shot from theknot.com showing off some of our dresses in an idyllic Hawaiian setting! Kind of makes us want to offer bamboo parasols in the future. Great element!



My Real Wedding from The Knot and The Nest.

Fabric Reservation for Bridesmaid Dresses

We've noticed that every set of bridesmaids tends to have one woman who must love to check things off her list and orders immediately after the bride chooses to use us for her bridesmaids' dresses. Inevitably, there's also a bridesmaid or two who wait until the very last minute to order their dresses. Sometimes bridesmaids may order months apart from one another in which case we may need to use different lots of fabric to produce the dresses. Although we do our best to color match, there may be slight variations in color if the dresses are purchased at totally different times.

In thinking through the issue, we gave some thought to being like other bridesmaid dress retailers and asking the bride to place the order for all the dresses at one time. We decided against this since we thought it defeated the flexibility we offered brides in letting their bridesmaids order separately without the bride having to lay out the money or repeatedly ask her bridesmaids for their measurements.

After some more thinking, we decided that the perfect solution was to allow the bride to reserve the fabric once she decides to use us for her bridesmaids' dresses. The price we're charging for the fabric is totally refundable once the dresses are purchased. There is a $25.00 charge for processing the fabric reservation but we think this is a small price to pay to make sure that even if a bridesmaid orders way late in the game, her dress will still be made from the same exact bolt of fabric used for everyone else.

As far as we can tell, we're the only bridesmaid dress retailer that offers this unique solution. Our reservation system also allows the bride to create specialized comments to her bridesmaids so they know exactly what to order when they sign in using the bride's reservation code. We're excited about this new feature and hope it's a great help to brides and bridesmaids the world over!

Bridesmaid Dresses on the Beach with Mix and Match Sizing

One of the things we’ve introduced since launching our site is “mix-and-match” sizing. Sometimes a woman’s measurements simply don’t match up with traditional sizing charts. We therefore decided to introduce a process whereby the customers can order a dress with the top made in one size and the bottom in another. Thus, someone with a waist that fits our size 14 dress and a bust that fits our size 8 can order the dress to be made in this way. There is an additional $20.00 charge for this service since it does require that we produce a new marker for the dress.

We’re really grateful to Jade for sending us these beautiful photos of her recent beach wedding. Her bridesmaids’ dresses were produced in our Turquoise and Orange Georgette fabrics. The styles are Strapless/Asymmetrical and Scoop Neck/Asymmetrical. Also, two of the dresses were produced using the mix and match sizing process described above.

How Beautiful is Alberta?

Although our focus is on bridesmaids’ dresses, we’re always particularly honored when someone chooses to use us for their wedding dress. For this purpose, our Strapless/Ballroom Skirt combination is the most popular. In White Satin, it makes a beautiful wedding gown, especially with an added beading pattern. The other dress featured is our Empire Top/Straight Skirt in Wine Satin (with spaghetti straps added).

Love that Alberta, Canada scenery!

Thanks for pic, Cheryl!

Modesty Dresses (in real life!)

We finally have some photos of our more modest dresses. The one above was sent to us from Alyssa, who, some eight weeks before her wedding date, wasn’t too thrilled with the velvet bridesmaid dresses she had previously selected from another vendor. She ordered a bunch of Modesty Long Sleeve Tops/A-Line Skirt dresses for her bridesmaids from us. The dresses shown are in Brick Red Satin. We also supplied a little additional fabric, free of charge, for the girls’ dresses.

Great Article with One Small Omission

We thought this was a great article in the NY Times discussing the growing trend of brides and bridesmaids customizing and buying their dresses online. Maybe it’s just our skewed perspective, but we think a mention of Coco Myles would’ve made the article even better since we offer more colors and customization than anyone else. Anyway, it’s nice to know the NY Times Sunday Business Section is taking note of the trend.

Coco Myles in Brides Magazine

Here is a link to the recent Brides Magazine Editors' Choice feature about our bridesmaid dresses.

Oh, Canada

Operating online, we think it’s imperative that we be able to accommodate customers all over the world. To date, we have shipped dresses to every continent except Antarctica. We’ve limited our Google paid-search campaign there so we’re not overly concerned.

We’re particularly happy with our Canadian business. Although we do charge $40.00 for international shipping and handling for Canadian orders, this fee is generally decreased, or eliminated completely, when more than one dress is shipped to a particular Canadian location. We’ve also found that our customers are usually surprised when they find out that we take care of the import duties and fees. It seems they’re used to other online retailers leaving them with the duty bill at the end of the day.

We just received these beautiful photos from Melanie, a happy Canadian customer. The dresses shown are in our orange satin and charmeuse. The photos really help show the difference between the bright charmeuse fabric and the more subtle satin. From left to right in the standing photo, we have a Strapless Top/A-Line Bottom with Pearl Ivy Beading in Orange Charmeuse (makes a nice maternity dress, no?) followed by two Scoop Neck Tops with Asymmetrical Bottoms and Waterfall Beading. All the ladies are sporting short red satin sashes as well.

Mix and Match Examples

We love when our customers send us photos. We think the following pictures offer great examples of different styles (in the same color) being used to coordinate a bridal party.

The first photo shows five of our Navy Satin dresses with Strapless Tops. As shown on the left-most dress, we do offer customers the ability to add spaghetti straps to our Strapless Top if requested. This dress also shows how the Asymmetrical Skirt looks paired with our Ballroom Skirts. Much thanks to Angela for sharing the photo with us!

The second photo features both our Scoop Nec (l) and Criss-Cross (r) Tops in Wine Satin. There's also a Short Sash in Brown Satin featured on the Criss-Cross dress. Many thanks to Cierra for sending us the photo!

More Modest Offerings

If we had to speak about one facet of our offerings that has been most influenced by our customers, it’d be the trend towards more modest dresses. It may very well be that not all women are that comfortable with the selection they have at traditional retail stores.

We’ve recently introduced two new modesty tops – a long sleeve modesty top and a ¾ sleeve modesty top. These tops are available in the same fabric, color and beading options that we’ve always offered. We’ve also added a new option for these tops – bows. The bows can be placed on either the wrist, neckline, or down the back. These tops are particularly suitable for religious events that require a more modest dress. So far as we know, we’re the only ones offering these kinds of options for modest dresses.

Ix the next few weeks, we’ll also be offering a pickup skirt which will be a perfect complement to the modesty tops. Our customers will also be able to match the pickup skirt with any of our existing top options, with the exception of the empire top.

We’re always happy to add to our Custom Couture line in order to give our customers as many options as possible and we look forward to continuing to receive your feedback so we can continue to offer you what you want.

Lighthouse Weddings

Much thanks to Shannon for sharing these beautiful pictures of her wedding with us. Shannon is wearing our Sweetheart Top with a Ballgown Skirt in White Satin. The beading on the dress is our Pearl Ivy. She paired her dress with one of our long sashes in pink satin. We think she made an excellent choice. We love the lighthouse photo -- especially how the clouds match the white satin.

Coco Myles in Prague

Prague is widely acknowledged as one of the most beautiful and romantic cities in the world. We were thankful when one of our customers, Veronica, sent us these photos from a wedding that took place in this majestic location. We had to deliver the dresses (shown here in our Lime Green Satin) to Wisconsin and Germany but had no idea that the wedding was taking place in Prague. We especially love the photo of the betrothed coupled getting bombarded by bubbles. We’re very happy, and honored, that our dresses were part of such a beautiful celebration.

Tffany Blue Wedding?

Given the amount of requests we've had for a blue that resembles that used by Tiffany's, we've decided to offer a new satin color called "Jewel Blue". The color is now available in our satin color palette.

Dyed to Match . . . Chuck Taylors

Much thanks to Amanda for sending us photos of her wedding. While we don’t offer dyed-to-match shoes (yet), we’re quite tempted to simply stock up on a wide range of Chuck Taylors so we can accessorize the footwear for both the bride (yes, she has them on too) and the groom. We’re also very honored that the décor of the hall matches the beaded stars on our Katie dress.

Brides Magazine Editors' Pick – Coco Myles!

We’re thrilled that Brides Magazine has selected Coco Myles as an Editors’ Pick for bridesmaid dresses in its September/October ’07 issue. We were able to provide Brides with a few of our dresses for a photo shoot and they loved them. In the recent issue, which is now on newsstands, they have a photograph of one of our Strapless/Asymmetrical Navy Charmeuse dresses with a Short White Charmeuse sash. Considering they’re the most widely read bridal magazine in the world, we couldn’t be happier. Hopefully, we’ll be able to post an image of the article. We’d do it now but we don’t want to run afoul of any copyright issues. For the time being, you can find us on page 186.

Skorch Magazine Article

We’re happy to be featured in this month’s (August ’07) issue of Skorch Magazine. About 30 clicks in there's an interview with us. Skorch is an online magazine that features fashion tips and advice for plus-size women. The editors of the magazine fell in love with our website and asked us a few questions about how we came into being and our ability to provide Celebrity Inspired dresses for plus-size women. Besides my incorrect use of the word “jive” (should've been "jibe", oh well), I think the interview went well.

Jr. Bridesmaid Dress Photos

As we mentioned in earlier posts, our Jr. Bridesmaid dress came about as a result of collaborating with our customers. We know the name is not the most original but we think it’s a great dress to accompany other Coco Myles dresses at a wedding. As you can see based on these photos, the dress also works great for flower girls. The first photo features the Jr. Bridesmaid dress in Ivory Georgette with Lilac Georgette accents (nice color coordination with that matching hyacinth!). The second photo is the same dress in Black Satin with Hot Pink Satin accents. The shot also features our Strapless Top with Asymmetrical Skirt in Navy Charmeuse. Much thanks to Julie, Chloe and Malena for sending us their photos!

Encrypted . . . and in Good Company

When we started a little over a year ago, we decided that we'd encrypt all the credit/debit card information we receive from our customers on our servers. This does tend to lead to the occasional problem of our having to call a customer for their credit card info if they want to add another item to their existing order or decide to use expedited shipping after placing the order. The usual response is "Can't you just add it to my existing order?" We answer this question by explaining that the encryption is for the customer's protection. This is usually, although not always, treated as a satisfactory answer.

Based on a story today in Internet Retailer, it seems that the hassle is well worth the effort.

On average, only 66% of merchants and other organizations involved in processing payment card data encrypt that data for transmission over the Internet, compared to 100% among best-in-class organizations, research and advisory firm Aberdeen Group says in a new study, “Protecting Cardholder Data.”

We will certainly continue to encrypt credit/debit card info even if it means a few extra calls to customers.