Kudos to Travis! He lost 35 pounds recently, just in time for swimsuit season. Happy with his weight loss, he took his Men’s Wearhouse suits in for the free alterations for life he was promised at the time of purchase. Unfortunately, Men’s Wearhouse wasn’t as thrilled with Travis shedding his college beer belly. They called his weight loss too extreme for their free alteration program, and demanded $50 per pair of pants. See what Travis has to say about this, inside.
A year ago I bought two suits after graduating college. That being known, after 4 years of college-style binge drinking and fast food I had plumped up a bit. Upon purchasing the suits from Men’s Wearhouse I was told free alterations for life. One year later and 35 less pounds (which isn’t a lot, but a decent chunk) Men’s Wearhouse wants to charge me $50 per pant alteration because I lost “too much weight” and they will have to “cut” the pants, whatever the hell that means, and “cutting” is not included in free alterations. On top of it all, they would need more than a week to do the alterations. You would think I went from morbidly obese to extremely thin as big of a deal they were making it. Nevertheless, I took my pants and left. Forget that.
I’ll definitely never shop at Men’s Wearhouse, or even return for alterations. Especially the location in Topeka, Kans, who initially exploited my lack of suit knowledge to tack on many unnecessary additions to my purchase with guilt trips and more (“Anybody interviewing for a position HAS to have…[product]“) and the location in Addison, Texas for telling me I’ve lost too much weight over the past year.
Travis
The Men’s Wearhouse website has this to say about their free alterations program:
We re-alter any previously altered seam free of charge. Because you never know when you’re going to gain or lose a few pounds.
So what’s the definition of a few pounds? If you brought the pants in during the weight loss, say every week or so for several months, would it be covered? Anyone know?
And Travis, there’s no shame in learning how to wield a needle and thread. Doing your own repairs and minor alterations could save you a lot of money, and some chicks dig a guy who’s good with his hands!
(photo:stirwise)
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I don’t know why you’ll want to alter fat pants. I mean, you’re going to have all that extra material and fabric weight just hanging around folded up inside some stiching. As cheap as that guy is, he’s better off buying a new pair of skinny pants and enjoying his new body.
Dude needs a new pair of pants. Sorry, even if they HAD altered it that much, I would think it would look odd.
Mens Wearhouse, they sock you on ties, $5-$10 ties for $40-$70. I went to buy some dress shirts and the salesman talked me into buying some ties. As we started toward the register, I handled the ties and instantly knew they were mediocre quality. I asked how much and it was $50. When I balked, I got the high pressure stuff and the claim that they were high quality material and workmanship. No Sale!
Profio, did you really tell this dude to learn to tailor his suit himself? Jeebus. I know, he should learn how to weave cloth, too.
“And Travis, there’s no shame in learning how to wield a needle and thread. Doing your own repairs and minor alterations could save you a lot of money, and some chicks dig a guy who’s good with his hands!”
perhaps you don’t quite realize how hard it is to alter a pair of pants. this isn’t sewing a patch or stitching up a hole.
@rellog: 35lbs is usually about 2 inches, sometimes 4 on an average height man. that’s 1-2 pant sizes since they’re usually done in even numbers.
@glitterati: Sorry, please try again.
Taken from the Men’s Wearhouse website.
What is your Re-alteration policy?
We guarantee if we have altered a seam once, you will never have to pay to have it altered again should you gain or lose weight.
This limitation is plastered all over every register and lifetime guarantee brochure they have. It’s part of the sales pitch as well. Re-doing cuffs, inseams, or any other seam is free to repeat. New alterations are not. I have a strong feeling the Op didn’t cut the suit when he bought it.
@sleze69: Syms does have good deals, but they’re insanely hard to find. 9/10 pieces of merchandise they carry has some minor flaw that you’ll have to pay to fix, negating some of the savings. Quality of the materials can vary as well. If I have two hours to look for a single pair of pants, sure I’ll check at Syms. But more often than not I’ll go to a dedicated menswear shop, although not necessarily MW or a JosABank. Independent shops tend to be much less pushy about the sale. It’s a much more pleasant experience.
I’m a guy, and 35lbs is more than 1/4 of my total body weight. If I moved 35lbs in either direction I would not expect to be able to “alter” any of my clothes so they would still fit me and not look stupid.
Jumping on the “unrealistic expectation” bandwagon here. OP, you’d really be better off buying a new suit. If they altered it, it wouldn’t look anything like the original and the cout wouldn’t flatter. I know it’s a pain, but 2-3 sizes weight loss is too much to maintain the integrity of the clothing item. Folks couldn’t expect them to alter it if you GAINED 35 lbs, would they?
So pretty much, screw Men’s Wearhouse. They messed my tuxedo for my wedding up pretty bad, enough that the wedding had to be delayed because they forgot to put the pants in the bag for the -second- tuxedo attempt. I’m still fighting with them to get someone to speak to me about compensation, with no result.
I think many are missing the key point here. As a consumer who has never bought anything from MW, I’m still aware of their ads and their promised claim of free alterations for life. They, simply, are not backing their promise/guarantee. The word alteration means to change (alter) – in the context of changing the fit to oblige changes in the purchaser. I could understand if MW refused to provide a free alteration if the OP went from a 34″ waist to a “42 waist (put on significant weight) because you can’t add to a garment, however, you certainly can take off from a garment.
My advice to the OP: write them off as a bad experience. Never go back and help others by continuing to share this shoddy treatment from MW. If you push the issue real hard, they may relent, however, I can assure oyu that they will intentionally do a miserable job and you’ll not want ot wear the garment after that.
One of two dreadful things will be done to the pants: (1) they’ll take in the waist big time, however, will not do anything to the legs and you’ll look like you’re wearing harem pants (M.C. Hammer time) or (2) they’ll take in the waist and your two back pockets will meet, looking like a kangaroo pouch from behind.
This posting has given me a real bad feeling about MW.
Congrats on the weight loss. And thanks to you and other posters for setting the record straight on that company. I never had a good feeling about them. It seems like a sleaze operation.
@Rode2008: I think you’ve created your own key point without regard for the actual facts. Alterations are ordered and priced by individual seam. What makes you think that just because they do a $4 cuff that they must do a $50 cutting for free? They offer to redo any seam previously addressed, but it would just be bad business sense for them to cave even 1% in this manner. The OP isn’t part of an alterations for life club, it’s merely a chance to update an old alteration.
They can’t change physics. There’s some things you just can’t do with cloth. At least they still offered to do it, rather than making him buy all new clothes.
Oh, wait, I forgot, in a man’s world, fifty dollars for dress pants is exorbitant.
Isn’t the literal definition of ‘few’, 3? I always thought it went, couple = 2, few = 3, several = 4.
I am actually a big fan of this site but on this one I am siding with the people who think that this is becoming a bitch-fest.
There is a huge difference between taking in the waist and completely recutting the garment. I used to run a Men’s Wearhouse and it is definitely not a “sleaze” operation. I can’t count the times that we let out and/or took in seams for people that had them previously altered at absolutely no charge.
It is spelled out in the guarantee if you would just take the time to read it.
As a frequent customer of Mens Wearhouse I can easily explain the situation. First time alterations cost a small fee. Second-time alterations involve cutting seams or hemming fabric is completely free. However, if you have lost enough weight to the point were they will have to recut the fabric and basically sew the pants back togther again, yes there will be a charge. This is a more time consuming process for the tailors. Also I’m sure Travis is unaware that the tailors are paid based upon the tailoring sales brought into the store. I’m sure if Travis had attempted to re-cut and re-sew all of his pants he would have been more than happy to pay the fee instead of wearing botched pants or buying a whole new wardrobe altogether.
As a tailor myself, $50 is a reasonable price. Those slacks need to be RECUT, which can take up to 4 hours sometimes. Men’s Wearhouse policy states that any seams previously altered will be re-altered for free. So once you pay the $50 for the RECUT, you will receive future RECUTS for free. But you must pay the $50 initially.
I know I’m late to the party, but the alteration policy, covers re-altering of seams that were already completed. That much weight loss is enough to cause them to need to do what is called a re-cut of the pants; basically taking them completely apart and re-making the pants. Since that was not done originally, it isn’t covered under the policy. In my experience, after losing about the same amount of weight, they credited the amount of the waist ($10) and the cuffs ($12) to the recut, and I paid something like $28, for them to make me a new pair of pants.