Under the Palm Tree

I mean, I would go on about how tacky and ugly Lilly Pulitzer clothes are, but I’m not trying to bash anyone’s style. Truth is, The service here is god awful and the women who run this shop are just plain rude. Don’t waste your money here!

I love shopping here! The store is so bright and colorful, and the staff is always friendly. Even during the cold Midwest winters, the store’s atmosphere makes me think I’m on a nice warm beach. It’s always hard for me to leave without buying anything. I am 25 years old and my mother shops here as well. They have styles that appeal to all ages. Every so often they will offer a «gift with purchase» which is always something nice. I am a loyal customer here and I plan to continue shopping here as long as this store is around!

Without a doubt this place offers the WORST customer service in the area. I am a loyal customer at Under the Palm Tree. I have spent a lot of money at this place over the years, they gave me $ 100 dollars in store credit for being a loyal customer. Every time I shop at Under the Palm, I cringe at that poor customer service and I ask myself why I put up with it every time. Let me divulge you in all the bad experiences I have experienced with this place.
1) UTP was running a gift with purchase promo at their store. I was ready to pay for my items and the sales lady decided to bag up my items without telling me that they did not have the gift with purchase items in. I confronted the sales lady about not receiving my gift with purchase and she acted like I was the biggest nuisance for noticing that I didn’t receive my gift with purchase after she walked away.
2) I came in a week in advance with my fiancé. UTP was receiving a new shipment of clothing in a week. I wanted to pre-​order several dresses because I was getting engagement photos taken in a week. The lady wrote down my information and said she would call the day before the shipment came in. I never received a phone call, so I called them myself. I gave them a list of all the dresses I wanted to reserve for my engagement photos. The lady over the phone said she would have them prepared for me the next day. I show up to UTP expecting my dresses to be reserved for me. They had NO dresses reserved for me. My mother went into angry mama bear mode and threw a fit. I settled on some dresses that I wasn’t expecting on purchasing. The manager decided to give me all the gift with purchase items for our troubles. I forgave them for this mistake.
3) I called the store about a blouse a friend had purchased for me online. My friend no longer had the receipt. I asked if I could return the blouse without the receipt. The lady over the phone seemed unsure whether I could return the blouse or not. She said she would call the Lilly store to see if the blouse could be returned without a receipt. I never received a phone call back.
4) UTP was having another gift with purchase promo on black Friday. I was looking for a certain print that was released. I asked the sales lady if they had the blouse in the print I was looking for. She said that they didn’t have the blouse in and maybe they would get it in on Monday. I told her that I would miss out on the gift with purchase then. She shrugged and said, the gift with purchases are limited and sell fast if they had any left they would give me one. I was frustrated with her because she wasn’t working with me on a good solution to my problem and she seemed like she didn’t want to deal with me through her body language. I knew leaving my name and number wouldn’t help because they never call back.
If you want to have a painful and frustrating shopping experience, where the sales lady could care less about their customers, then Under the Palm Tree is perfect for you. I would suggest skipping this place and shopping on the Lilly Pulitzer website or purchasing from another Lilly Pulitzer via shop. After my last visit, I purchased all the Lilly items I wanted from Splash of Pink. I still have a $ 100 dollar loyalty store credit at Under the Palm. Spending that money is not enticing enough to deal with this place.

I am sad to write this review, but it is necessary. After ordering a dress and some other items recently I received my order. One item was cancelled out of the order and the other, a dress– I was sent the wrong dress. Wrong style, wrong print. After 3 phone calls (voice mail was «full «on the second 2 and 3 emails — I finally had to file with my credit card. Now I am spending countless hours researching and providing the credit card documentation. I even offered to accept several other styles of the original dress I ordered trying to be flexible. Absolutely no response. Would have been so easy to make this right. I find out after the fact this is a common issue for this store. They sadly do not care about making things right. I don’t take writing a poor report for a small store lightly as I have a great amount of empathy for the small business owner… but given the time and effort (still unresolved) I have put into this… I am disgusted. Another Lilly lover put it an interesting way– I wouldnt shop here if the items were 99% off. It isnt worth it. Too many options. I hope the store reads and considers taking a class in customer service.

I shopped at Under The Palm Tree looking for a dress for my granddaughter to wear for rush week at college. It could not have been a better experience! All the sales ladies were helpful and sweet. We had been to several stores that day and did not find anything and walked into Under The Palm Tree and had four dresses that were perfect. What a delightful experience!
Jeane

Boutiques are supposed to distinguish themselves, in part, through excellent customer service and treating EVERY customer equally. If you define this by being completely ignored for over 20 minutes while the manager and clerk are chatting away with the other customers about what their boyfriends last name is so they can determine if they know that family, then this is the place for you.
As for me, I felt like I walked onto the set of The Help. Apparently, I didn’t fit the appearance of a valued customer and was completely, I mean completely ignored while trying to find a dress for my daughter. 20 minutes in a small boutique is a long time. We walked back and forth numerous times looking for a dress. Never ONCE did anyone greet me, ask if they could help me, or anything. Had the store been busy, I might have understood. But, instead, they seemed to have prioritized the two other customers in the store. Maybe they fit the «brand» better. What snobbery.

I’m sorry but I have to give it good marks — for as obnoxiously preppy as it may be — there’s no other store in Kansas City quite like it and I can’t deny that it has whimsical appeal. First of all — the woman who greeted me at the door looked and sounded like Glenda the Good Witch — she practically floated to me and that SMILE — I had to wonder — was she really THAT happy to see me?! Well I believed it — it made me happy — she greeted me like she hadn’t seen a soul in years.
Starting with their front entry merchandise, Lilly Pulitzer is selling her grandmother’s mini chocolate chip cookies in a jar — very fitting to the whole ‘I’m a perfect wife’ theme. And of course, alongside the cookies was the new line of resort sandals. Summer may be over — but summer is the poor mans winter anyways — for who else can afford Acapulco in December but the husbands of the Lilly Pulitzer-​wearing women of Johnson County?! (I do have a point here, I must say so).
Regardless, if I had no inclining as to its stigmas, if I had no preconceptions about LP — I would think it a truly fun place to shop. It’s perfect for a little girl who loves girlie things and the color pink and playing with dolls, it’s perfect for women who like to look impeccably charming an have the money to pull off such a look. It’s fanciful — it embraces palm trees and sea turtles on nearly every shirt, skirt, and dress and it embraces their signature quirk.
I must stress though, as we enter the winter months, LP has little to offer the Midwest in terms of actual warmth and coverage. I saw one style of coat in two colors: pink and blue. There were more canvas totes perfect for carrying swimsuits than there was winter wear. Resort clothing in Johnson County is not far-​fetched and LP does their best to provide to this clientele, clearly.
Again — the store is impeccable and besides the obvious jokes about trophy wives — there’s little else to laugh about because Under the Palm Tree is entirely its own.