Home | Tell a Friend | Donations | Resources | Blog

2/21/2008 - LYNNE writes:
My husband and I were stupid enough to join in 2006- we planned on remodeling our kitchen in a few years and wanted to check it out. We went to the "open house" and were sucked in by the "join now or never" ploy and dreaming of the savings that we would have in the future when we finally did remodel! We haven't ordered much since then. On many items that we have considered buying, by the time you add tax and shipping and handling the price is not worth it! We ordered a swingset for our children and paid for it at the showroom. Two days later we received a call saying that a slide was not included in the set - did we want one? We were told that we had to pay extra for a slide. When we told them that the catalog said that the slide was included they played it out that they had never ordered a swingset before and that company said that it was not included in the package. Then we were called back again saying that they had underestimated the freight costs and that we owed additional freight in order for the company to ship it. Since we had told our children that they were getting this great new swingset - how could we refuse! We bought our daughter a new bed out of the "Directions Catalog" which is supposed to be like a sales catalog - and the shipping and handling costs were as much as the headboard!- no deal there either! I was just online looking to buy a new couch and chair and for $450.00 worth of furniture they tack on an extra $184.00 in additional fees --- Rip off! I know that I could find a couch and chair for just as much or less than that on sale at a local furniture store! Where is the savings? Then after I cancelled out my on-line order I happened upon this web site. I wish that I had known this earlier - I never would have joined! I feel so stupid!!! I am torn between buying from them in the hopes to regain some of the $ that we shelled out or just forgetting it and chalking it up to my gulibility. What do you have to do to make this investment worthwhile? Buy a shitload of high end merchandise? Order a lot of crap from one manufacturer in order to reduce shipping costs? Any ideas on how to salvage some of my investment? I hate DB for conning me into this!!

2/21/2008 - mommyof2 writes:
I am sad to say that my husband and I succumbed to the DB pressure 3 years ago when we started building our house. Let me just say, that these people are really nice until you're a member. Then you don't matter, because they already have your money. Well, it turned out that the only things we even purchases from there were a couch and sofa set, dining room table, and basement carpet. By the time you added on the shipping and the 8% "handling charge, they were more expensive than other places! By the way, our dining room set, took over 3 MONTHS to get here!!!! and they were VERY rude about helping me with it all! ya, so please be smarter than us and don't join! we will not be renewing our membership. just chalk it up to a lesson learned! i always feel like telling the poor "open house" guests to run and not look back!

2/20/2008 - R. Barlow writes:
My husband and I attended Direct Buy's 2 hour presentation here in Indianpolis, Indiana. After the presentation, my husband signed up for the membership. We told the supervisor I we will call back the next day to give the credit card to pay the downpayment of $560. My husband traveled for two weeks and totally forgot about the pmt. We assumed that since there was no payment made, the memebership is not valid. Just today, I opened a mail from a Law Office who handles legal business matter of Direct Buy. The letter was demanding us to pay the membership or else they Direct buy will file a lawsuit against us. Direct Buy is making it sound like we owe them the full amount of $4,500 for the whole 3 year contract. I felt like we are being "ripped-off" If there is any class action against this company, please contact me. I will hire an attorney to get involve with this.

2/20/2008 - joe writes:
they wouldnt quantify their savings claims when i offered them a product list for a pending remodel so i walked. how can they hustle me for 2 hours and not be willing to spend 15 minutes backing up their savings claims so that i could give them $5300? smells funny...

2/20/2008 - phil writes:
Run do NOT walk from this company. I did in fact fall for the same repeated story, discount pricing! But when they called me for the appointment I first stated no wife and wanted a few basic questions answered. This is the first indicator that they are a company that has alot to hide. NO answers, just the same story line that has been noted on this website, great service and savings. Based on the lack of answers, actually a rude person with no answers it appears that I am one of the luck ones to save the $5-6k and join! I am going to report DB to the Ohio attorney generals office. Again, run do not walk from this company! No answers up front, equals poor service on the back end!

2/20/2008 - Nancy writes:
I wish I had read all of these reviews BEFORE wasting three hours listening to a Direct Buy sales pitch. We didn't fall for it, but we did think that a company that advertises "you are guaranteed to win two of five prizes" is actually obligated to do what they advertise. When we declined to shell out almost $5000 for membership dues, we were shown the way out. When we stopped at the reception desk to ask for our "promised prizes", the receptionist looked at us like we were aliens! Then, she handed us a vacation brochure which contained no vacation sites in our state. When we asked about the free luggage, she acted surprised and asked a colleague, "Do we have any of that luggage or are we out?" Of course, they were "out." She then said we would have to come back when they had some. We asked her to write on a piece of paper that we were entitled to receive a set of luggage from Direct Buy. She snickered and flippantly complied. We have the paper in our possession, but realized that there was never any intention to offer free luggage. Just wondering - has anyone out there EVER gotten the free set of luggage????? If nothing else, this false advertising alone should be grounds for some kind of consumer action. We tend to be skeptical of ANYONE who says we have to made a decision right then and there. They also emphasize that failure to sign up means you have missed the chance of ever being invited back - thank goodness! I hope that part of their spiel is correct.

2/18/2008 - BringdownDirectBuy writes:
I am an employee at a Direct Buy location. I cannot disclose which one for obvious reasons. I have consulted with a lawyer who happens to be a member of my family and after showing him the scripts we are force-fed and required to memorize verbatim, scatch-off-card, key and other information they send you he says there may be grounds for a class-action lawsuit but he needs to do research with the FTC and others to determine if there is anything we can do as a group. It will take money and time in order for this to happen and Direct Buy treats their employees like crap. I have also managed to acquire some of their so-called savings pricing and compared it with retail prices and some of the other posts on this board are correct. The price at Direct Buy is higher. Plus the lead-times can be 4-8 weeks (or longer) and in addition they charge an 8% handling fee plus shipping on top of everything else. Direct Buy is an out & out SCAM and I have set up an e-mail address and a Paypal account in case anyone wishes to contribute to this. I can get a job elsewhere so I'm not worried about that. I just want this company brought to it's knees. The owner has multiple homes, drives a fancy car & is a scumbag & I would like nothing more than to see his empire destroyed. Please send whatever you can through Paypal to []. Everyone who contributes will be added to the mailing list and kept informed as things progress. I am very serious about this & need your help to make it happen. At the very least I am writing to the editor of my local newspaper & if necessary will take out ads in papers and magaizines across the country to insure that others don't fall victim to their advertising and high-pressure sales tactics. While I am on the inside I will continue to gather damaging evidence against them for any court cases we may get out of this. I cannot do it alone & need as much help as possible to acheive this goal. Thank you in advance to all who contribute.

2/17/2008 - bruce writes:
my wife and i saw threir infomarical.so we watched it thought well why not check it out. so we went to db. and listened to their lecture. and how much we can save. and at the end their you get a free gift. that was a joke.so after you listen they come to your table. we got the db nazi.he was not going to take no for a answer. and i just had my arm amputated.and i told him that i was not going to give you my money that i lost my arm for.he then got up escorted us to the door told the woman at the front desk they didn't join. the free gifgt was a big joke a vacation that you got to pay for. and you get a key if it opens a lock you win.hey db. i go to lowes and home depot get scratch and dents and its alot cheaper then you offer. think about this people. you pay 5 grand to join. then say you pay thirteen hundred for what ever then you have to pay them db to deliever it.please don't waste your money.

2/17/2008 - Karen writes:
As with everyone else - we have seen the DB infomercials over and over and over again. Since we are trying to gut and redo our kitchen, I thought I would call the number and check it out. The young lady wanted us to set an 'appointment' to come in. I told her I was available on Saturdays, but my husband works most Saturdays. She said it was a REQUIREMENT that we BOTH come in....now, it's starting to sound like one of those sick sales jobs...yes...'timeshare' comes to mind. As an independent career woman -- I also take offense at the requirement of having my 'husband' there. So, I told her so. Didn't make any difference....it was a requirement. So, I took a stab at a Saturday date...and she said that this is a very limited group of appointments & to call if we couldn't make it. I informed my husband that we were going to drive about 60 mi....on that Saturday to see what DB had to say. Well - he had to work...so I called & reset the appointment. 2 days prior to the appointment, I got a 'reminder' call. Again, he had to work - and the young lady (a different one) was quite 'snippy' with me about our missed appointment. I let her know, in a very business like manner, that I could only attempt the appointment - it was their rule that my husband attend with me. At that time, my husband's uncle became gravely ill and was put into hospice. There wasn't any hope of him living. When I called to let them know - they were quite irritating - acting as though my husband's uncle did this on purpose - and we couldn't just keep changing appointments - as there were a LOT of people waiting! THAT DID IT! I told them they could take their sexist 'appointment' and put it where the sun don't shine. After reading everyone else's comments & the ridiculous fees they charge -- with mis-information and the usual 'sleezy sales pitch' -- I am glad we never attended!

2/17/2008 - allen writes:
EVERYTHING these people are saying in this DB complaint file are TRUE TRUE TRUE. We all have had the same pressure job and now know the truth about this scam joint. Why would anyone even think of wasting their time here. Now comes the question of the hour. WHEN WILL THIS PLACE FINALLY BE SUED OUT OF BUSINESS. You or I could never get away with this scam without being sued to high heaven. Tell everyone who will listen that this place is a scourge on society and a black eye to other legitimate businesses. They must be laughing their but off at their sales and planning meetings about how stupid they think their victims are.

2/17/2008 - Doug writes:
What a waste of time !! That's the only way I can describe the agonizing experience of sitting through a DB presentation. My wife and I have sat through more than our fair share of time share "presentations", so we were somewhat ready. The first red flag went off when our sales rep, as we were waiting for the "pitch", asked what we did for a living. After a long day of work, and a snowy 40 minute drive (and my wife beat from being outside at a high school nordic ski race in -8 or about 20F temps), we weren't sharp enough to give a response like, "we're shepherds", but we knew we were being sized up. The presentation itself was an insult. OK, we all know what "markup" is, you don't need to pound it into our heads for 45 minutes. And I'm sorry, but don't ask me to hold onto my questions until the end, when you're hoping that you've bs'd me enough that I will have forgotten. When the "we have to protect our manufacturers" line came up, we wanted to walk out, but like most Canadians, were too shy to do so, so we sat silently seething. The "figures" the pitcher came up with were wildly misleading...suggesting that a family with an income of 60K pays 7K a year in mark-up is WILDLY misleading. Grocery stores, where we spend a large chunk of our monthly disposable income, have an average profit margin of 1-2%. But, if you followed her figures, since our income is twice that, we would be paying 14K/yr in markup - I don't think so. I would have loved so see some references for the figures she was quoting, but of course just like the retailers, DB doesn't want us to know -or maybe there is no proof. With two teenagers just a few short years away from post-secondary education, we don't have the $$ to spend on renovating our house with the custom shower fixtures like you see on the Canadian DB ads, let along the $%)) over the first 3 yrs - and we'd have to spend a LOT to recoup that ! Judging from the appearance of our presentation companions, I don't know where they would find the money, either. After the pitch, we were lead breathlessly to some catalogue that showed what a great savings we could get on framed Group of 7 prints. Not that we could comparison shop, however. At that point, as we were paired up with our reps to get the final hard sell, we asked for our coats (makes it harder to leave when you don't have them with you).....to their credit, although they offered token resistance, they showed us where they were, and off we went, grumbling about the wasted Valentine's Day evening....

2/16/2008 - Bobby writes:
I am a contractor/ builder. It was my intent to get to the bottom of what I new was a scam. but I had to prove it for my clients and potential clients. I am not going to go into great detail for I gave many more important things to do. but if it quacks like a duck and walks like a duck it is a duck. These to good to be true scams are just that. To go to be true and these operatives work on the ignorant with due respect. Stay away from this place and use your head. If the world was all wholesale the economy would colapse and that is reason enough to consider economics 101. Please get real people I had to walk out with disgust and then on our ride home it was laughter and hurt for the poor people that fall for this outrageous scam.

2/16/2008 - Bill writes:
Well, I was scammed by Direct Buy too. The same way everyone else was. I am curious though, has anyone tried taking them to small claims court? What was the result? I am curently in touch with the Indiana Attorney Generals office. Maybe if enough of us got together we could close them down. Maybe even get our money back. I hope this web site will let us converse.

2/15/2008 - Benny writes:
My wife purchased a sofa the first of Dec 2007, after direct buy checked on shipping, it was as much as the sofa. She went ahead and paid for sofa and shipping. Will receive it Jan 12.. WRONG. After several calls and a very rude manager named Doris, it was on its way on a truck from California will arrive Feb 12. Today is the 15th and still no sofa. I'm going to try and get my money back that my wife wasted. I did renew for one more year but no more after this.

2/15/2008 - Denise writes:
They call all day and night without leaving a message when the answering machine starts. When I called to get initial info I was told someone "might" call. The number of calls that come in from them daily runs between 2 to 6 starting at 9:30 a.m. and running until 9 p.m. A bit over the top and a real turn off to the company! The number of calls has put me off from trying them as a buying source.

2/15/2008 - Doreen writes:
I attended a DB open house in Queens, NY last evening. I was automatically skeptical when I entered the reception area and the poor secretary was answering a phone continuously for "Service". I honestly think the same few people kept getting disconnected and continued to call back in the hopes of getting someone to speak with them. Not a good sign. The second "red flag" was the absolute (though polite) refusal to discuss membership dues before the entire presentation was complete. The product that is displayed during the presentation is cheap and hideous to the average person. I asked if they sold product made in the US-I think that actually threw the guy for a loop since he replied that "Everything is made in China lately". Sorry buddy-I'm building a house and my husband and I have been able to get all product made right here in the USA-although at a price, but who cares! He assured me that I would be able to find what I was looking for in the catalogs-again, a few more probing questions later and I knew there was no way I was going to be able to find what I was looking for there. $4500 later and I would have been out a chunk of money that could have been well-used elsewhere and Marshall would have been showing me catalogs of disgusting furniture made God knows where while he laughed his way to the bank...Please, just do some research, make friends with your local appliance guys (who will definitely give you a discount and probably waive delivery fees) and get good quality stuff. DO NOT fall for this scam and waste 90 minutes of your precious time. IT IS NOT WORTH IT!!! By the way, those of you who actually got refreshments must have been at a high-end DB. There was nothing-not even a water fountain...

2/15/2008 - Bruce writes:
I'm ready for a class action against these criminal that call themself Direcbuy. They're the scum of this earth, pls. do not make any appointment with these creatures.

2/14/2008 - Tim writes:
Building a new home, my wife and I thought we'd look at DB in Knoxville TN. Not having seen this site, we went with an open mind and believed their savings speal. We took with us prices of things we needed, i.e. wood flooring, tile, etc. They could not fine ONE thing we took. When I found a wood floor comparable, it was discontinued. they had a hard time finding things. Still, we believed we could save money so we paid the membership. Then we got on line and had the same problem. A couple of days later someone we met at the talk called me as asked if I had seen the this site. Then she said, "did you know they add 8% onto the total cost, including taxes and shipping. I nearly died. NO! I said. Look at your contract she said and I did. I immediately went to the showroom and said I wanted to cancel my membership and get my money back. THe "Owner" said, "Why". I said, "because you were NOT straight up with us at all." When I said, "You never told us you add 8% onto the cost," he said, "Yes I did. I said taxes, shipping, and handling." I said, "That was NOT the same. You should have been honest and said, you add an 8% fee, not merely saying 'handling.' Honesty would have been to say you add 8%." He argued that he said handling. Why was he afraid of being honest? Because no one would join. I pointed to the showroom full of suckers buying stuff and said, "Everyone out there is paying you 8%, even on the shipping, you're making a fortune on them and you still charge a huge membership fee. You were NOT honest and I want my money back." With no argument, he wrote me a check. I can only thank that great lady for calling me, She saves us a lot of money. Whatever you do, don't believe you will save money. At the rate you might save, you will have to purchase $60,000 worth of merchandice to just get your membership back. I'm so disappointed that the owner could not be totally honest and just say, "And Direct Buy adds 8%." This would be honest and let people decide based on honesty, not a totally coverup. This is unprofessional and a scam and should be reported nationally.

2/14/2008 - Angela writes:
I ordered cabinets through direct buy and they guaranteed my satisfaction. I gave them a diagram of my kitchen with approximate measurements. The designer asked me for the measurements that I didn't have and assured me that he had everything from me that he needed to design my kitchen. I originally wanted all wood cabinets but he convinced me to buy cheaper cabinets because they would be ready faster and I was in a rush. When the cabinets arrived in December they didn't fit. One didn't fit because he ordered a cabinet that was too big, it partially covered the window. The other didn't fit because he never asked me for a door measurement while designing it, therefore, it wouldn't fit through the door. We took the cabinets back and showed them pictures of the cabinets that didn't fit. The manager assured me that they would reorder both cabinets and had a different designer design a totally different design that would actually fit. They said it would arrive in about 2 weeks because they were rushing the order. I called two weeks later and was told that they never ordered the cabinets because the ones that we returned were scratched from trying to get them through the door. They said that they wanted their movers to try to get in rather than accepting the cabinets back. The movers called me and verified over the phone that the cabinets would not fit because the door frame was too small. I was again told that there would be a rush order on my cabinets and they would be there in two more weeks. I called two weeks later and was told my cabinets were in. My husband went to pick them up and there was only one box. We were told that the rest might be coming Tuesday. I called Thursday to check on the status and was told that they never placed the order. They said that they wouldn't replace the cabinet that wouldn't fit through the door because it was my fault that they didn't have a door measurement. They said that they took the kickboard off of the bottom and they were going to make us take it back. They said it should now fit through the door. It was sitting there the whole time. The woman then said that someone should have told me that awhile ago. They are not prepared to live up to their satisfaction guarantee. I also have not saved any money because of having to eat out every day since December. I could have gone to Home Depot and spent less. I am very disappointed because I spent 5000$ on the membership and have not saved any money and have not had ANY good experiences with them. I either want new cabinets or compensation for the money I spent unnecessarily eating out while waiting on cabinets that they never intended to order. Is there anything I can do?

2/14/2008 - Jim writes:
My wife and I bought into it several years ago. I forget exactly how much it was, but I think it was something like $3,500 for the first year, and then like $100 annually after that. We cancelled after 1 year. It's not necessarily a "scam," but the people that actually benefit from the membership are few and far between. It is not a lock and shut case that you are going to save big money, like they try to make it appear in the sales presentation. What we found was a.) you obviously have to be in need of a lot of high-priced items (i.e. furniture, etc.) and b.) you have to have expensive tastes. Fortunately we were moving into our new home and did buy some furniture through them so we believe we about broke even from it. But, if you're not moving into a new house, doing a major remodeling project, or something like that, you will be ripped off. As I mentioned, the biggest savings you get are on high-ticket items, which if you don't buy anyway, what's the point. I would never spend $10,000 on a TV in the first place, so the fact that I can get it at DB for $6,000 does nothing for me. The other thing they fail to mention in the sales presenation is you are responsible for freight costs, which can amount to hundreds of dollars for larger items like furniture. This eats into your "savings" as well.

Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36