Crimson Reflections

Back on March 27th, I was scrolling through facebook and I saw a post from Loki Doki Doki advertising these super cute sweet lolita shoes with cat ear details from Seven Dreams.

I especially was excited by that sparkly deep blue color. I showed my girlfriend, and she really liked them too. So we decided we each wanted a pair in dark blue and red, and I also wanted them in sax. The shoes were listed as RMB188 each (~ $27.34 USD) on the post on facebook.

She frequently orders lace and stuff from taobao for her indie brand, so we figured we would just lump them in with her next business shopping service order. I looked up the brand, we went to the site… and every single pair of shoes seemed to have it’s own listing. So, for every color above there were 2 listings, one for low heels and one for higher heels. To make it worse, some listings used pictured of the wrong heel heights. They also were a preorder, which makes things a bit more complicated for the shopping service. We also were getting ready for Tekko at the time, which for me meant finding new shoes and blouses for 2 new dresses that my girlfriend had very kindly bought me for my birthday, and it we generally just didn’t have the time or energy to figure it out. We usually buy shoes from indie chinese designers on taobao maybe once a year, if that, and so we just, really didn’t know how to interpret the google translate word salad we were getting. The shopping service she uses for her business isn’t really geared towards these two-step fashion orders either, they are more of a place you use when you buy 200 hangers, so they weren’t going to be a big help either.

So, I went to Loki Doki Doki’s facebook page, and there is a pinned doc right at the top with instructions. We decided what colors we wanted and I downloaded the spreadsheet to my phone. I opened it with google docs, edited it, and then sent it to Loki Doki Doki via facebook messenger with a link to their reservation post instead of the shop listing since we couldn’t figure out which listing, all via my phone. Loki Doki Doki noticed the same thing we had; that the listings were confusing and asked to contact me back in about six hours after they could look at them on a computer (which, yeah, that is absolutely more than fair, because we had been staring at them for a good 30 minutes on a computer before giving up already).

There is a time difference between them and us, so we went to bed. I meant to wake up super early, but I slept in until 8 the next morning and they had sent me back the spreadsheet updated with the totals at 6, and had applied a discount (the store got at least 4K orders, so they made them cheaper, awesome!). They also said the store was close to the cutoff for the max number they would make (just 150 orders from 5k orders!), so they sent the paypal invoice right away to help make sure we made the deadline. I checked the sheet, it looked good, and so I paid right away. Payment 1 was $98.50 + a $2.99 fee from paypal for the international transaction. (This is normal; the shopping service didn’t try to charge me the paypal fees separately or anything. Paypal applied this fee themselves).

They let me know that because the store was close to the 5K max number of orders, and because they suspected the store would hit that number, the second payment would probably be the latest possible time the store was advertising, which would be some time in may. This is great information to have, and the turn around time is pretty reasonable for a pre-order like this.

On May 14th, I woke up to a message on facebook from Loki Doki Doki saying that the second payment was due. They also said that they were having trouble with one of the warehouses they use for forwarding to the US loosing packages and asked if they could use a more expensive, but better one that would do things like take pictures of the items and offer insurance. I confirmed that this was totally ok and got the invoice a bit after that and paid. The second payment was $43.75 + a $0.99 fee from paypal.

On May 15th, I got a message with a status update saying they were off to the warehouse. (Keep in mind I’m on the other side of the world from them, so to hear back the next day, or faster is great!)

On May 18th, I got a message that my shoes had gotten to the warehouse and I was re-assured that the sizes and colors had been checked and confirmed. I was also forward the proof photos from the warehouse.

I was also sent screen captures of the different shipping options + prices. SAL shipping, at 337 Yuan (~$49 USD) was the cheapest, while DHL priority at 1008 Yuan (~ $145 USD) was the most expensive. This is pretty normal; shoes are heavy and bulky. Loki Doki Doki also sent me a photo from the warehouse of a pair of shoes + the shoe box they came in and said that if I wanted, the warehouse could re-pack them without the boxes into a smaller package to try to save money.

Personally, I prefer to pay a little more for a lower chance of damage, so I opted to keep the shoe boxes and use EMS shipping at 579 Yuan.

I got a reply back on the 18th a few hours later saying they would bill me later that day when they were at a computer, but because I had answered pretty late for the time difference, a couple hours later, it was the next day (for me), May 19th when I got the invoice for the shipping. Again, we had a big time difference, so this is totally normal. The final invoice was for $94.57 + a fee of $4.73 from paypal for the currency conversion.

Loki Doki Doki also asked what value I wanted declared on the package, and said the estimated value was $117. They also offered to remove the price tags from the items. Declaring a lower value / removing price tags is a common thing that people ask for in countries with high customs charges. However, personally, I don’t do this. (As someone in the US, I’ve also never been charged customs on EMS packages from China).

Total Costs:
Payment 1 ………………………… $98.50
Payment 1 PP Fee ……………… $2.99
Payment 2 ……………………….. $43.75
Payment 2 PP Fee ……………… $0.99
Shipping ……………………………..$94.57
Shipping PP Fee ……………….. $4.73
——————————————————-
Total (5 shoes): $245.53
Total per pair: $49.11

May 20th, I was messaged an update with the tracking history so far in China, plus my tracking number.

And May 24th, my package was delivered! It was secured with plastic ties and well taped with water proof tape for safety like most boxes we get from Chinese companies. The cardboard was nice and solid and strong too.

In side the box, each shoe box was sealed in a plastic bag to protect it, and they were slotted together in the box so that they took up as little room as possible. Nice and neat.

Inside the plastic I found a cute lavender shoe box printed with the brand name (Seven Dream). The shoes were wrapped in dust bags and packed with little plastic sticks, like any other pair of shoes one might buy from a fast fashion shoe store.

The shoes were delightfully well constructed. I looked over them pretty thoroughly and the sewing was neat and they felt sturdy. The toe box is a nice shape (not too bubble toed), and the patent material feels quite durable. On the blue pairs, everything was quite even. The shoes had snap closures instead of the weird hooks you sometimes see, and of course, buckles for adjusting the strap length.

All of the bows are permanently attached except the tiny one on the ankle strap. On my red pair, that tiny bow was uneven, but it was uneven the same way on both shoes (bow maker that day just made uneven bows? who knows). It’s tiny, it blends in and it’s totally detachable, so I really don’t care, honestly.

I haven’t worn mine yet aside from just around the house, but my girlfriend had a booth in the new dealer’s hall at Colossalcon last weekend and she wore her blue ones the first day they were open. She said that they were “good shoes” and her feet were “happy feet”. Considering working a dealer’s hall usually means standing on concrete for hours, that’s some pretty high praise.

I would say that these shoes are most similar in quality to my Angelic Pretty shoes. They are higher quality than bodyline or an*tai*na shoes for sure. I also prefer them to the one pair of Empty Wardrobe shoes I have. I feel that the price (just under $50 USD including fees and shipping) was reasonable for the quality, and I have paid more in the past for shoes that were less nice. The extended sizing (Chinese size 34 – 41) was nice as well; a lot of Chinese brands cut off at 38, which is usually too small for me. Because I have had problems in the past with Chinese shoes running small, and because I wanted to add a heel pad, I ordered a 41 (I wear an 8.5 US and a 24.5 or 25 in Japanese shoes). I found that there was some extra room in mine, so the 41 probably is really closer to a 25 or 25.5. The fit of the smaller pair (34 / 22cm) was as expected as well.

All in all, I’m very happy with these shoes from Seven Dream, and I’m very happy with Loki Doki Doki as a shopping service. In fact, my girlfriend already put in another shoe order with Loki Doki Doki on her own for a different pair of shoes!